


The Big Scary Unknown

by sithwitch13



Series: Her Story, and Everyone Else's [2]
Category: Avengers (Comics), Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-01
Updated: 2012-12-11
Packaged: 2017-11-20 00:27:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 25,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/579282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sithwitch13/pseuds/sithwitch13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“People don't want their lives fixed. Nobody wants their problems solved. Their dramas. their distractions. Their stories resolved. Their messes cleaned up. Because what would they have left? Just the big scary unknown.”</i> -<span class="u">Survivor</span>, Chuck Palahniuk</p><p>In which life as a SHIELD liaison isn't a James Bond-esque fantasy, being an adult sucks, and friends are valued.</p><p>Sequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/428594">Her Story, and Everyone Else's</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So... some two weeks, huh? The short story is, lots of things happened, including the story itself changing directions at least three times and some health issues. The longer version includes physical therapy and being unable to write more than a few hundred words at a time, but everything's okay now and this story's finally finished! I'll be sticking to the same schedule I did before: a chapter a day, which lets me get last-minute edits done.
> 
> On a quick aside, thanks to everyone who commented and left kudos on _Her Story_. You really don't know how much that helped me out when I was feeling like absolute crap.
> 
> Thanks to Tek and [Lurkz](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lurkz/pseuds/Lurkz) for beta reading for me, and you don't know how glad I am that y'all got into this fandom!

The day that Darcy had told Nick Fury that yes, she agreed to be liaison between SHIELD offices and the Avengers, she had pictured (somewhat nebulously) that she would be sitting in a swanky room with some kind of super-awesome Stark-equivalent to Bluetooth in her ear and doing _Minority Report_ things with touchscreens, coordinating schedules or something. And possibly sipping a martini. It seemed to her that spy-like things should involve martinis. She blamed years' worth of James Bond marathons on New Year's Day.

This was pretty much nothing like that.

She stood in the middle of her unfurnished apartment, in her pajamas at three-fifteen in the morning, trying to make sense of what whoever was on the other line of that call from SHIELD was currently telling her. "Do what?" she asked blearily, trying to run a hand through her hair and getting it caught in a snarl.

"Director Fury wants to meet with you first thing in the morning," whoever was on the other line said again, slower and louder. "At the NYC SHIELD facilities. And, I quote, 'dressed like an adult.'"

"I dress like an adult," she said sulkily, finally untangling her hair and looking for something to sit on. There wasn't much besides the floor and her bed just yet. And a pile of cardboard boxes that she hadn't had time to unpack because of shit like this, shoved off to one side and looking pathetic, but she didn't want to sit on those for fear of finding the one breakable thing that would inevitably be in there and destroying it with her ass.

"I'm only repeating what I was told," the SHIELD flunky on the other line said, sounding smug. She was certain he sounded smug.

"Couldn't he have emailed me this at like, an hour when normal people are awake?" she asked.

"I couldn't say. Seven a.m. sharp," the asshole said, hanging up.

Darcy could have thrown the phone across the room in frustration if a) it wasn't entirely too much effort considering she'd had like three hours of sleep before she'd been woken up and b) the phone was shiny, new, and awesome and there was no way she would go begging back to Tony for a new one just a week after getting this one.

It was now a question of whether she wanted to stay awake for the remaining few hours until she had to be at SHIELD headquarters for whatever weirdness Fury had in store, or whether she wanted to try to grab another two and a half hours of sleep. A whole three, maybe, since Thor was in town and if she did puppy eyes she might be able to convince him to fly her there. But probably not, since that would ruin her hair, and...

Crap. "I thought I left all-nighters behind when I finished college," she said to the empty air and stomped over to the Avengers-only elevator.

"Should I take that as instruction, or just a complaint?" came JARVIS' ultra-polite voice from one of the extremely well-hidden speakers.

"Is anyone up right now?" she asked.

"Captain Rogers is awake."

Right. The guy who seemed to have chronic insomnia and made lots of cracks about how sleeping for almost eighty years meant he had plenty stored up. She grabbed her terrycloth robe and nodded. "Yeah. I'll go up there, then. Thanks, JARVIS."

"Of course, Ms. Lewis."

Steve looked up from the open kitchen of the main floor when the elevator door opened, and Darcy raised her hands defensively. "Whoa there. It's just me. The butter knife can go back to making whatever weird food you're craving."

"It's just peanut butter and banana," Steve said.

"The Elvis special," Darcy said, nodding sagely and making her way over to the couch. "Yeah, nothing weird about that one. Just don't deep-fry it. You don't mind the company, do you? Apparently I'm supposed to have a meeting in a couple of hours and it doesn't really seem worth it to go back to sleep."

Steve looked around--for who, she didn't know, there wasn't anyone else hiding in there that she could see--and shook his head. "No."

"Awesome. Keep me awake, okay? I mean it. I'm not going to meet with Fury looking like I just got run over by a bus."

The super-fancy TV wall screen was on, turned to early morning History Channel programming. She watched it for a while, feeling her eyelids droop. "Supposed to be keeping me awake, Rogers," she said.

"Sorry," he said, seating himself at the other end of the sofa with a small stack of peanut butter and banana sandwiches on a paper plate. He looked at them, then at her. "Did you want one?"

"This early? Nah. But thanks."

He set to work devouring all of the sandwiches-- _all_ of them, and it was kind of scary--and she watched, since it was mildly more interesting to her than a history of tanks or whatever the hell was on the TV. She found herself remembering him sitting right about there, looking haunted, telling her, _I found out he was a fan of mine, did you know that?_

He. Phil Coulson. The man who stole her iPod and Jane's research in New Mexico, whose job she had taken just a couple of days ago.

Who wasn't so dead as everyone else seemed to think he was. The deception sat wrong in her stomach. She couldn't imagine one of her friends lying to her about something like that. It was bad enough finding out that one had lied about her ass looking fat in those jeans or yes, I did sleep with your boyfriend when I said I hadn't but you guys were _totally_ broken up at the time so it's okay, right? Little deceptions like that hurt bad enough after the fact.

A big one like this didn't even bear thinking about.

"Are you okay?" Steve asked, bringing her back to herself.

"Do the huh?" she asked, jerking upright.

"You were just looking at me and frowning. Are you okay?" His eyebrows creased slightly. "Do I have something on my face?"

"Nah. Just thinking." She grinned, though it felt more than a little forced to her. "Has anybody ever told you that it's like watching a whale inhaling krill when you eat?"

Steve looked slightly pained.

* * *

She arrived at NYC SHIELD headquarters on time. Early, even, which she thought spoke well of her and her competence.

Naturally, she'd made an effort to wear something obnoxiously youth culture-y because damned if she was going to let Nick Fury goad her into wearing a pantsuit. Anyway, it wasn't like he had any right to call people out on how they dressed. She was pretty sure Matrix coats had gone out with the early 2000s unless you were cosplaying. (Or unless you were Nick Fucking Fury, who she had to admit totally rocked that look.)

He didn't seem at all surprised or perturbed or anything by her defiantly non-professional appearance, which was both completely unexpected and somewhat disappointing. Darcy had been looking forward to using that Matrix jab since she'd thought of it at five in the morning. "Ms. Lewis," he said, sitting behind his still impressive and mostly bare desk.

"Mr. Fury," she said, leaning back in her chair with her arms crossed, trying to match his tone. He'd had years of practice so it was no contest, but she could still try.

"It's been a week," he said without so much as a _good morning, how are you?_ "It's time you got into the swing of things, as it were. You're getting your first real assignment as Avengers-SHIELD liaison."

"Wait, what?" Darcy uncrossed her arms and sat up straighter. "What have I been doing all week, then?"

If Fury had been anyone else, she had a feeling that he would have smirked. As it was, he gave her a flat look. "Easing in," he said. "Part of Agent Coulson's duties--" He couldn't have missed the way her fists tightened at the sound of that name, but he didn't react-- "were to assess anyone who ended up on SHIELD's radar and could either be a threat or asset. And since you've been taking initiative on that yourself..." He raised an eyebrow at her. Probably a disapproving eyebrow. She still wasn't sure where exactly he stood on her push to add Spider-man to the team, even as a part-time guy, and she had the sneaking suspicion lately that her former roommate Jessica's stint as Jewel was probably on SHIELD's radar as well. "It seemed like the perfect first big assignment for you."

"So, what, I go out, say hi to people, ask them if they plan to use their powers for good or evil?"

Fury's smile was tight. "Something like that." He slid a stack of files over to her. "Some homework for you to look over," he said.

"Oh boy." She took the files, hesitant to look at them. "And then what?"

"And then I'll let you use your discretion." He went back to whatever papers he'd been looking at before she'd walked in, effectively dismissing her.

She snorted. "So you had someone wake me up at the ass-end of the morning, had me brave rush hour traffic to get here on time, and you just spent five minutes giving me a folder and telling me to 'use my discretion'?"

"That's all, Ms. Lewis," he said, just starting to sound annoyed.

Darcy took the hint and left. In her short experience with him, any meeting with Fury where he didn't yell at her counted as a win.

* * *

The first thing she did when she finally got back was to grab a nap. Stupid morning meeting, messing up her schedule.

The second thing she did was look over the information in the folders. Lots of names, some photos clipped to them, and some brief descriptions of observations and incidents that had presumably brought them to SHIELD notice. She did her best to study them, she really did.

"So how the hell were you guys recruited?" she asked, wandering into the main floor and still rifling through the papers.

Bruce looked up from a mug of coffee and Natasha raised an eyebrow over whatever she was currently reading on her shiny awesome tablet. Probably work related. She was dedicated like that. "What?" Bruce asked.

"I'm supposed to like, go talk to people," Darcy asked. "And I have absolutely no idea how this works. It was one thing when it was, you know, my boyfriend. But I don't think, 'Hi, I hear you have powers, want to talk about it over dinner and a movie?' is going to work with everyone on this list."

"There's a list?" Bruce asked before shaking his head with a rueful smile. "Of course there's a list."

"You didn't think the people in this building were our only priorities, did you?" asked Natasha.

Bruce sipped his coffee. "I'm usually too preoccupied to give it that much thought, actually."

"So," Darcy said, hopping over the sofa and crossing her legs. "Any advice? Pointers? What worked for you?"

"Don't shoot first," Bruce said thoughtfully.

Natasha pursed her lips and nodded. "Yeah. That about covers it."

"Seriously. That's your advice. Don't shoot? I don't even have a gun."

"It worked for me," said Natasha. "The rest of the details are all classified way above your clearance level."

"Hey, I'm totally cleared to know stuff now," Darcy said. "I'll probably find out at some point."

"I doubt it," said Natasha.

"I think you're on your own," Bruce said, turning toward the elevator. "You're a people person. I'm sure you'll figure something out."

"So good to hear," Darcy grumbled. "So, seriously. What do I do? Normally I find this shit out completely by accident."

"Normally?"

"Well... you know. With Peter." She didn't mention Jessica coming to her rescue out of literally freaking nowhere, or bringing home a guy who'd been advertising his superhuman-ness on Craigslist and banner ads. Even though SHIELD, and therefore probably Natasha, probably knew about them anyway. Stupid all-seeing secret organizations. And it wasn't like Craigslist and banner ads were discreet, anyway. She'd have to mention that to Luke the next time she saw him. "And I did just kind of stumble into Thor, and therefore everyone else here, completely by accident."

"The way I heard it, you hit Thor with a truck."

"A, it was a van, and B, Jane hit him the second time. And she totally tried to take the wheel the first time, so that was probably her fault, too."

Natasha graced her with a small, controlled smile that seemed to be the kind favored by super-spies. "And yet you wormed your way into the good graces of everyone here not Thor or Parker."

"So dragging them--" she waved the folder like a fan-- "out for frozen yogurt and going on long walks could potentially work, is that what you're saying?"

Natasha shrugged and returned her attention to her tablet.

Darcy looked down at the folder. "Well, shit," she said. "At least I can get frozen yogurt out of it."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which food is eaten, conversations are had, and phones are the tool of the devil.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much, everyone! I'm so happy that people still have an interest in this story. I hope y'all continue to enjoy it!

"So, do you like frozen yogurt? You're not lactose-intolerant, are you? Or vegan?"

Peter rolled his eyes. "Darcy, you know I'm not lactose-intolerant or vegan."

"Play along. You're supposed to be helping me."

He sighed theatrically. "No, random stranger who I have never met before in my life and am certainly not _dating_ , I'm good."

"You can get as much as you want, and don't be stingy on the toppings," she said graciously. "My boss is paying for it. Or will be, once I actually do this for real. So don't get ambitious, the pay raise doesn't go into effect until next week."

"You're so good to me. You might want to remember to add 'save the receipts' to your list there," he said, pointing to the checklist and script on her phone. "Otherwise I'm not sure you can get reimbursed."

"Oh! Right. See? This is why I bring you places." She tapped _receipts_ into the notes.

"Of course," Peter said dryly, grabbing two empty yogurt cups. "And here I thought it was my good looks and stellar company. How could I have been so wrong?"

"Clearly Tony's ego is rubbing off on you," she agreed, taking the cup he offered her and skimming the flavors.

"How will I ever bear the shame?"

"Help me finish this fake interview thingy and I'll consider it a draw."

"It's a deal."

Once they were actually sitting down, she cleared her throat. "Right. So, these superpowers of yours--"

"You realize that you can't actually say that in public."

"Like anybody ever listens to what anyone else is saying out here. I'm secretly an alien from outer space and I had wild kinky sex with the President of the United States last night." She said it all at a perfectly conversational tone and waited for a reaction. "See?"

"Okay, so you're planning on exploiting self-absorption and cynicism for your own purposes. I applaud you. Your interviewees might be a little nervous, though."

"Aha, I thought of that."

"Nobody says 'aha' in real life."

"I just did. This is where my babbling comes in handy. See, if I babble at them first, that should make them feel more at ease with me, right?" Darcy chomped on a big spoonful of yogurt, which was wonderful and chocolatey with lots of candy and syrup on top. It completely negated anything healthy about yogurt, but who gave a crap, it tasted wonderful.

"You do kind of get people off guard that way."

"Like you," she said, popping the spoon in her mouth and smiling.

"Like me."

"There's also the fact that you're a gigantic dork, which helped. So, blah blah blah, assume I'm doing my usual thing. Do you feel especially inclined to talk about superpowers and whether or not you feel like doing gratuitous property damage with them?"

"How come I never got one of these talks?"

Darcy frowned. "You're getting one now."

"No, I mean before." Peter shook his head. "Back when everything started, you know?"

"Actually, I've been thinking about that. Look at the people you--we--work with. And the people I'm supposed to talk to, the really high priority ones. They're all kinds of destructive. Sorry to say, Pete, but you're kind of little league compared to, like, a guy in the tabloids suddenly owning a suit covered in missiles and being an alien thunder god."

"Hey." Peter looked affronted at that. On the edge of a full-blown pout, even. "Spider powers are incredibly useful."

"Useful, yeah. Destructive, though? Not comparatively. You've got your shit under control. I mean, more or less." She beamed. "See? That was a compliment."

"I'll take it in the manner in which you meant it, even though you made me sad," he said, not sounding sad at all.

"You had people watching you, though. I read your file. They were waiting for a really big screw up."

Peter made a pained noise.

"Back on the subject. Do you think this is going to work at all?"

"I think you won't know until you try it," he said, stirring at his own yogurt.

She slumped in her seat. "This is going to suck, isn't it? What the hell have I gotten myself into?"

"A job," Peter said, except it was muffled by food. He swallowed, and in an unmuffled voice, added, "Except you picked one a lot weirder than most. Which is a completely valid life decision."

"Which, coming from you, means very little."

He gave her a lopsided grin. "I'll take _that_ as a compliment, too."

* * *

It occurred to Darcy that Google-stalking her targets was nothing when compared to Google-stalking supplemented by the resources of a shadowy organization that liked to know everything about everyone. Eventually she just turned all stalking over to SHIELD's people, because it was their job and freed up her time.

Sort of. She still had a shitload of other things going on. Her super awesome new phone was flooded with texts and emails and memos and reminders and notifications and the damn thing _never stopped_ beeping or buzzing and she couldn't bring herself to turn it off. If she turned it off for five minutes, it would naturally be the five minutes when Peter ended up in the hospital or the world ended.

Life was much more interesting now.

When she didn't have to wrangle wayward superheroes or coordinate schedules for Thor's trips to and from Asgard or field things to SHIELD or Stark Industries' somewhat frightening public relations offices or keep track of _every bad thing going on everywhere ever_ (or that was what it felt like, even if Natasha assured her that she was in fact only getting the really bad shit through her filter), she worked on prioritizing how she was going to prioritize Fury's list.

Where to start was obvious. She called Jessica and offered to take her out to lunch, since inviting her over was kind of a coin toss on good versus bad reactions.

"I want to go somewhere nice," Jessica said.

"Done," Darcy said immediately.

"What's the catch?"

"Jones, I'm hurt. I can't grab lunch with you for no reason?"

"Ordinarily I'd say no. But you have _that_ tone of voice and you're calling me from _that_ phone number instead of emailing me about it like you normally would, so something's up."

"Fine, something's up," Darcy admitted. "I want to check this out with you first."

"It's some of your crazy job shit, isn't it?"

"It's partially my job shit, and only a little crazy," she said. "And like I said, I'm running it by you first. I figured you'd appreciate that."

"Someplace _nice_ ," Jessica said. "I deserve nice."

The nice place wasn't Tony or Pepper's definition of nice, maybe, but it was more than a few steps above fast food. It seemed to put Jessica in a good mood, which was why Darcy waited until just before dessert (if she was going to ask this, she was damn well going to order dessert) before bridging the subject.

"You want to what." Jessica's voice was flat. Her face showed a remarkable amount of flatness. There was not a lot of reaction for Darcy to work off of, and it was freaking her out.

She tried a different tactic. "Look, SHIELD has files on everyone of interest."

"And we're of interest."

"You're not in the top twenty, if that's any comfort."

"Not really."

"It's just going to be practice for me and a way to get even further under SHIELD's radar for you guys."

"How exactly is this going to get us under their radar? Having more information on us--"

"Means they're not going to send anyone out to _get_ more information about you. I'll be the one who hears it and files it under no threat or whatever stamp they give me says, maybe my boss will read it, but nobody else will unless you guys do something to put you in the public eye."

"Or if they think they can use us."

"Yeah," Darcy said. "Unfortunately. But they have files like that on pretty much everyone they think is potentially useful or dangerous, like I said. You should see Jane's, it's like..." She held her palms a few inches apart. "They have to keep filling it with useful stuff she's doing, and when she's on, she's _on_." She frowned. "I haven't seen her in a week, actually. I should probably check on her. I bet she's locked herself somewhere and forgot what day it is."

"Back on _me_ for a minute," Jessica said, pausing while the waiter brought their desserts and resuming quieter after he left. "I'm guessing this is going to happen whether or not I say yes."

"Well, you've kind of got to agree to be interviewed," Darcy said. "But if I put it off and, I dunno, get fired or something--" She wasn't going to say killed, even though that was a possibility, because she did _not_ need to jinx herself less than a month into this job-- "and someone else took over..." She shrugged. "Devil you know, right?"

"I guess," Jessica said grudgingly. "Let's say I agree. I'm not saying Luke and his buddy will."

"You know I know his name, right?"

"I'm not saying it in public."

"Okay. I get that." Darcy poked at her dessert, an incredibly decadent-looking crème brûlée that--oh yes, tasted exactly as good as the description on the menu indicated.

"But _if_ I agree--it still doesn't leave me with any sort of guarantee that your creepy Big Brother superhero club is going to leave me alone. What if they decide they could use me for something?"

Darcy poked at her dessert with her spoon, not looking up. "Yeah, that's the weak point of my plan. There isn't a guarantee. I could do my best to like, shuffle things around and try to keep you guys out of their notice as best as I can, and you've got to admit, the Avengers do a damn good job of deflecting attention."

Jessica nodded reluctantly, her grouchy expression softening slightly. "Between an alien god and Tony Stark, that's got to be some good distraction right there."

"You'd like Thor, he's a sweetheart. I wish you'd come meet him at some point. Really, they're nice people, more or less. Anyway, it's not a guarantee, but it's the best I can do. I mean, I'll do it regardless because you're my friend and all."

There was no talk for a little while as Jessica devoured her food, a chocolate cake that Darcy only slightly regretted not getting herself. "No promises," she said again. "But I'll think about it."

"Great," Darcy said. "Oh, and you might want to let your buddies know, I'm pretty sure SHIELD watches Craigslist. So they're already kind of screwed."

Jessica rolled her eyes.

* * *

Her phone didn't start beeping at her until after she was already on her way home. In a cab, because now she felt okay about spending money on cabs. Jane was right, being SHIELD valued personnel was awesome, even if it came with stupid responsibilities along with the big bucks.

Like now. The alert going off let her know that there was something going on somewhere in the world that needed the Avengers', and therefore her, attention. She had already grown to hate that alert.

_Please let it be Tony doing some stupid publicity disaster. I can handle a stupid publicity disaster,_ she thought, even though that was really more his own company's area of expertise. She breathed a sigh of relief at the alert; it was someone at SHIELD bouncing her a report on explosions at some North Sea oil field. Which sucked, sure, but it wasn't as bad as she'd thought. She skimmed the report, made a note to see if Tony or Bruce could go check it out and do whatever science-y things they could to help fix it--okay, maybe Bruce since Tony would probably see it as competition, so she just wouldn't mention that to him for now unless they needed backup--and she could have it wrapped up soon.

She paid the driver, hopped out of the cab and walked into the tower, this time doing a slower read-through of the report. She waved absently to the receptionist and security on the first floor as she let herself into the special elevator and leaned against the wall. "My floor, JARVIS," she said, frowning as she scrolled up and down on the phone's screen.

Since the Avengers had turned their attention to more mundane troubles after the alien invasion of Earth, assholes had been crawling out of the woodworks to get noticed by them. Like really annoying roaches, occasionally with costumes of varying degrees of craftsmanship, rarely (and more terrifyingly) with horrible weapons. What was it Natasha said that Thor had said? It was like the Avengers being around upped the game, or something similar. Yeah, Darcy wasn't going to argue with that.

She stepped out of the elevator as the doors opened and took a moment to still be impressed by how quick and non-vertigo-inducing and efficient it was. "Thanks, JARVIS," she said, still not willing to take anything that could answer her back and acted like the tower's brain for granted, and went to go sit on... something. Nothing. The floor.

God, she needed to find the time to unpack. Maybe she'd ask Steve and Peter and their freakish strength to do it for her. But after she had this latest crisis taken care of.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which roles are reversed, breaks are needed, and reunions are had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise, things are actually starting to happen in this story. I hope y'all continue to enjoy it! Thanks!

The knock at her door caught Darcy mid-snore, her hair making some kind of horrible new tangle over the back of her head as she leaned against the boxes she'd been using as a recliner. She twitched, trying to throw something at the noise, but her arms didn't respond. "Give me like three seconds," she croaked out, checking to make sure that she was still wearing pants, that her arms were still attached to her body (they were, but she had _epic_ numbness going on and she was seriously never going to use that stack of boxes as a bed again) and that her breath wasn't too rank before deciding that whoever woke her up could deal since they were in fact the asshole who woke her up.

Said asshole was her former teacher, now-friend, current most hated person in the world by sheer fact of waking her up, Jane Foster. Jane looked cheerful, because of course she did. Darcy saw, by the sudden freeze and wilt of Jane's face, that she looked like hell. "Did I come at a bad time?"

"I was grabbing a nap," Darcy said. "Why did you never tell me that moving up in the world totally sucks balls?"

"Because I work in a nice snug lab where only science happens," Jane said. "Peter called, by the way. He said he wasn't going to be able to meet you for dinner and that you've been busy--" Yeah, Darcy caught that look, the _so I see_ look of the comfortably rested-- "so I picked up some Chinese food for you. You like Chinese food, right?" She held up the bag that the mostly-closed door had hidden just out of sight.

"Gimme," Darcy said, all uncharitable thoughts forgiven.

A few mostly empty containers of food later, and Darcy found herself spilling the frustrations of the past couple of weeks to Jane as they both sat cross-legged on the floor with a carton of potstickers in between them like a really tasty campfire. "--and it just doesn't stop! I've considered burying my phone in a dump somewhere, you don't even know. I think I'm getting a twitch. Am I getting a twitch?"

Jane leaned in and looked at her dutifully. "I don't see a twitch."

"That's because it's weirdly quiet today, which is _why_ I could actually sleep. I was planning on unpacking. See all these boxes? They've been in these exact same spots since I moved in."

Jane shook her head and Darcy could see her trying to hide a smile. "You could have asked for help."

"But everyone's so busy," she said, and she could hear the whine in her own voice. "I keep sending them places."

"You do know that Erik and I are still around, right?"

"I figured you're doing science stuff."

"Well... yeah, but not _all_ the time. And we're not big buff superheroes, but Erik can lift things, and I'm not exactly useless." Jane patted Darcy on the hand. "Don't worry. We'll help you out."

Behind her glasses, things started getting a little blurry. "Is this what it felt like being on the other side of the equation in New Mexico?"

"Maybe a little," Jane said, grinning back at her.

There really wasn't a good way to swipe at her eyes and not have Jane notice, so Darcy just did it, sniffed, and said, "I really don't want to work on unpacking boxes right now."

"Yeah. Want to go watch a movie?"

"Thor's not here, you know."

"I know. We can go out to an actual movie theater if you want." Jane's eyes widened theatrically at the words "actual movie theater" and Darcy snorted despite herself.

She gave it serious thought before shaking her head. "Let's just go upstairs. I'd feel like a dick if I had to run out halfway through to take care of business."

"Okay," Jane said, starting to consolidate leftovers to shove in the fridge.

"I'm gonna go take care of this," Darcy said, making a rough circle with her hand around her face. "I feel like I look like a trainwreck."

"You just look tired," Jane assured her. "And besides, nobody has to look their best in their own home. It's kind of a rule. Or it should be."

Darcy laughed, but excused herself to the bathroom anyway. One of the bathrooms. Since the entire floor was hers, there was actually more than one, though she'd only set up camp in the master bathroom.

She splashed some water on her face, worked out the worst of the nap-tangles and settled for just shoving the whole mess under a hat, and walked back out. "Movie time," she announced, shoving the dreaded phone into her pocket. "Let's do this."

* * *

"Move over or get out, losers," Darcy announced to the room at large before the elevator door had even finished opening. "We're commandeering the TV and putting on _Mean Girls_."

Clint, stretched out across the couch with one arm thrown over his face, yelled back, "You can't do that, I'm watching this."

"You are _not_ watching a _Home Improvement_ rerun."

"He thinks Wilson's hilarious," Natasha said, not looking up from reading some book or other across the room.

Darcy took a moment like she always did, never entirely certain if Natasha was fucking with her or not, but pushed past it. "Five second warning, Barton, move or be a seat. Jane's ass is bony."

"Hey."

"Shh, I'm threatening him."

"No you're not," Natasha said, still not looking up.

"Fine," Clint grumbled, sitting up. "Does it have to be _Mean Girls_?"

"We're having a girl's night," Jane said primly. "Darcy needs it."

Clint smirked. "Being team mom isn't all it's cracked up to be?"

"I know where you sleep and I will cover your entire head in egg beaters one night," Darcy said.

"No, you won't," Natasha said.

"No, I won't," Darcy said with a sigh. "JARVIS, is _Mean Girls_ queued up anywhere in that giant robot brain of yours? I need it."

"I'll see what I can do, Ms. Lewis."

"You are a god among talking houses."

"I'll be sure to relay that back to my creator."

"No, don't tell Tony! His ego doesn't need to be any bigger. There won't be enough room for the rest of us here." Even Natasha cracked a smile at that one. Point: Darcy. "Okay, Clint. Are you in or out for girls' night?"

"I've always wondered what girls' nights are really like. Will there be pillow fights and skimpy underwear?"

"We may raid Tony's liquor cabinet and start making bitchy comments about people we hate," Jane said. "I've really been wanting to go off about one of my techs all week."

"Clint makes a decent martini," Natasha said, surprising Darcy by closing her book and standing to saunter over to the group at large.

"More than decent," Clint said, stung.

"Serviceable," she told him.

"You're just picky."

"I have refined tastes."

Clint snorted, Natasha flashed that quick smile, the one that Darcy was almost positive was her _real_ smile and not the one that just looked real, and they settled back and started the movie.

And yeah, by the halfway point Clint started making mixed drinks, and then Darcy joined in with a few she'd picked up in college, and it was a desperately needed respite from the whole mess of the past couple of weeks even with the hangover she knew she would have the next morning.

Despite the horrible headache and feeling like something had died in her mouth, when she woke up on the couch, she felt like just maybe she'd be okay going forward after all.

* * *

The feeling lasted all of about a day, until Jane, Erik, and Peter showed up to actually help her unpack.

"Sorry I can't help much," she said, sitting in a corner with a Bluetooth earpiece in, a tablet in her hands, her phone at her side, and the files Fury had given her strewn around her in a sprawl. "I've really got to work on this."

"You don't have to explain," Peter said, using a box cutter to open something labeled "KITCHEN" in big blocky Sharpie letters. "I'm sure that between all of us really really smart people, we can figure something out."

"If I'm so smart, why am I relegated to lifting heavy objects?" Erik grumbled.

"Because I volunteered you," Jane said.

Darcy let their conversation fade into background noise while she flipped through her notes and what SHIELD had sent her over the past day. One of the top people of interest, Carol Danvers, was going to be in New York for the next two days, which moved her up to the top of Darcy's list and meant that she had to move fast. Danvers seemed like she should be willing to cooperate, judging by the file: former Air Force, ex-CIA, now head of security for a private spaceflight development company. And it looked like that last job had put her in contact with something freaky and someone had caught her on a cell phone camera flying and blasting energy or plasma or something out of her hands.

Okay, the hand-blasts made Darcy worried. But that was why she had to not piss Danvers off and make sure that everyone stayed on each others' good sides, right?

This was going to suck.

The knock at her door jarred her out of her notes. "Could someone get that?" she yelled. "I'm trapped in paperwork."

"I've got it," Peter said.

"Hey," she heard Clint say. "I heard Darcy needed some help down here, and I figured I owed her for the hangover the other night..."

"Natasha asked you?" Jane asked.

"I may have," Natasha said.

"Everyone's out on business, so--" Clint's voice stopped, and Darcy looked up to see him, paused mid-movement and blank-faced, staring at Erik, who looked back, also frozen and taken aback.

"Is everything okay?" Jane asked, breaking the silence.

"Fine," Clint said, tossing a tense, tight grin Jane's way. "Point me at something to unpack."

"Erik?" Darcy asked.

Erik stammered. It was weird. She hadn't expected him to be starstruck or whatever. "I didn't expect to see you here--I guess I _should_ have, but--"

"Oh, you know each other?" Darcy asked. "Dude, when were you bugging scientists? Well, I guess you had to be somewhere when you weren't trying to teach my cubemates about _situational awareness_ or whatever--"

She noticed, too late as usual, Jane's frantic handwaving. The kind that told you to shut up in no unsubtle terms.

"We've all met," Natasha said breezily, resting a hand companionably on Clint's shoulder. Clint snorted and shrugged it off. "SHIELD's smaller than you'd expect."

"Right," Darcy said uncertainly. "So I'll just... go back to my notes, then. Call me if you have any questions about where stuff goes."

"You'll thank us when you see your improved, more orderly, more _tasteful_ living space," Natasha said, making her way to an already open box.

"That's not a great vote of confidence for someone who's supposed to be _organizing your superhero-ing schedule_ ," Darcy said, glaring over.

Natasha smiled primly back at her and didn't say anything. Damn her.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Darcy goes recruiting, meets new and interesting people, and things get out of hand quickly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to everyone who's read, commented, left kudos, etc.!
> 
> For anyone who's interested in Carol Danvers' actual canon backstory, the currently ongoing comic "Captain Marvel" by Kelly Sue DeConnick (in which she gets a well-deserved promotion, name-wise!) has a great flashback to how she got her powers in the most recent issue, #6. The first arc ("In Pursuit of Flight") should also be out pretty soon. And of course, there's always [scans_daily](http://scans-daily.dreamwidth.org/?tag=char:+ms.+marvel/carol+danvers)'s Carol Danvers tag!
> 
> Also, slight warning for brief violence.

Darcy took in a deep breath, blew it out, and adjusted her jacket. If the past day had reminded her uncomfortably of cramming for finals, then she could finish the metaphor and do this. She had always been better at tests than studying. Just get it over with, deal with everything later.

Of course, "everything" now meant Nick Fury.

And she couldn't think about that now, because Carol Danvers was just inside this stupid building, should be coming out from her meeting any minute now, and if Darcy missed her then she'd have to spend all afternoon at the NYC SHIELD building trying to track her down again. Darcy fidgeted. How did Coulson do it, she wondered for the eighth time that day and eightieth time that week. Just pop in like it was nothing and give everyone the Talk.

He'd had the suit and age to give him gravitas, too. Darcy could have gone out and bought a nice tailored suit, but she balked at the idea. It felt like selling out. And it wasn't her tactics. She still dressed like a college student, which... okay, might have hurt her credibility, but she had a SHIELD badge now to offset that. The secret agent, Men in Black thing might have worked for Coulson--equipment-stealing, death-faking, SHIELD ninja that he was--but she had the power of being underestimated.

She might still save up for a swanky outfit, though. Just not a suit.

Darcy fidgeted again, not even pretending to look at her phone now as a larger group of people than before walked out of the building. None of them were Danvers. God, why couldn't the woman just leave so they could get this stupid talk over with? It wasn't like people didn't have other things to do.

She was so distracted by boredom and resentment that she nearly missed Danvers walking out and had to run to catch up. Danvers walked fast, deliberately avoiding everyone else around her, slipping sunglasses on as she went. She looked like _she_ should be the SHIELD employee.

"Hey!" Darcy called once she was close enough that she was sure that Danvers wouldn't out-walk her. "Hey, you got a minute?"

Danvers turned and looked at her, turned back, and kept walking. "Not interested, kid. Whatever petition you want me to sign--"

"Not even if it was a petition for making planking an official national pastime?"

Danvers stopped and pinched the bridge of her nose. "If that's an actual thing, I may push you into traffic."

"It's not. I just needed you to slow down. You walk _really_ fast." Darcy huffed out a breath. "Damn. Harsh threat, too. All over a stupid petition? Anyway, no petition. I'd say it's nice to meet you, but you just threatened me, but I did mention planking so I'll let it fly. Darcy Lewis, agent of SHIELD." She held out her hand. She'd been practicing saying that in front of her mirror all morning while she got dressed, just to make sure it sounded suitably suave and awesome.

Danvers stared over the top of her sunglasses down at her hand and then up at her. "You're a SHIELD agent? You look like you're not even out of high school."

"And I'm sure that in ten years I'll look back on that and feel comforted. Ms. Danvers? Carol? Can I call you Carol?"

"No."

"We're gonna grab some lunch, okay? I'm paying."

"If I say no, what are you going to do?"

"I'm gonna have to call in backup and we talk in a quiet room instead of the dining establishment of your choice." Darcy smiled brightly. "I'm not gonna do anything weird, I promise. Just lunch and a nice talk and you go on your way and I go on mine. I know you want to be left alone and I _really_ don't want to have to fill out extra paperwork if you bolt."

Danvers looked at her watch and sighed. "If you're paying, there's a place I saw on the Food Network that I want to try."

"Done," Darcy said instantly and feeling a little like the Lunch Fairy.

* * *

Danvers had good taste in Food Network shows, Darcy decided. An Italian restaurant just a few blocks from the harbor owned by a chef that even she'd heard of, and everything smelled great. She debated flashing her SHIELD badge to get them seated quicker, but decided against it. She wasn't even sure it would work.

Once they were seated, Danvers leaned back in her seat, eyes narrowed and frowning across the table at Darcy. "So SHIELD's hiring college kids now?"

"I graduated," Darcy said with as much dignity as she could muster.

"Of course you did. Cut the shit, what's this about? I've heard about SHIELD. Didn't have the catchy acronym in my day, though."

"I like the acronym," Darcy said. "And seriously, why name it something that long and annoying if you aren't going for the acronym? Anyway, you have to have figured by now I'm here about this." She held out her phone, which had the shaky footage of an apparently flying Carol Danvers on it, the recording going just long enough to show red blasts of energy from her hands before it stopped.

To her credit, Danvers never once so much as raised an eyebrow as she watched. When the video was over, she just leaned back in her seat, arms folded across her chest, daring Darcy to say something.

Which, to her credit, Darcy was good at saying many somethings. "Okay, to be fair? It's a pretty shitty video so it's not a hundred percent clear that the flying lady blasting shit is you. I'll give you that. Maybe like eighty-five percent? Ninety. I dunno, I studied political science. And hey, I did okay in my math courses, but I was there for the other stuff. _Anyway_ , your records don't show that you're a mutant or anything. Not that there's anything wrong with that," Darcy hurried to add. "A friend of a friend knew a kid who ended up going to that school in upstate New York. I've heard it's pretty awesome. So if you're not a mutant, and you showed baseline human in all your physicals that SHIELD has on file... what?"

She didn't bring up the possibility of falsifying records. Not yet. Danvers was defensive enough without being called a liar.

Danvers stared.

Okay. Darcy needed to think fast. Think... like this was Natasha she was talking to, maybe. Natasha was all about the stoic, letting people talk until they hanged themselves, never saying a word unless it suited her type of thing. It was one of those things Darcy wished she was good at sometimes. _Now_ would have been one of those times.

She leaned forward, elbows on the table, pretending it was Natasha across from her and giving her that implacable look. "You know I'm living with a bunch of superheroes, right?"

That got a reaction, even if it was just slightly more rapid blinking and a twitch in Danvers' cheek. Darcy continued. "Okay, so they don't all actually live there full-time, but it's like a hostel for wayward Avengers. And I used to live with some other people with powers. Oh, and some jackass my mom went to school with tried to go all supervillain on my hometown when I was a kid, but in dressing up and robbing banks way, not a superpowers way. I'm not like, a power-chaser or anything. It just kind of happens." She shrugged. "Some people see blue cars or the number fourteen everywhere they look, I get people who do weird shit."

Danvers quirked an eyebrow up, arms still crossed. But hey, she'd reacted. Darcy pressed on. "You know Thor, right? Okay, maybe you don't _know_ -know him, but you have to have seen him on the news. I know him." She puffed out her chest. "We ran over him in the desert. My former boss and me, that is. She's dating him now. Me and him, we're just buddies."

"You ran over a Norse god."

"Also, he's an alien. Awesome, right? Or, at least, I _think_ he might be an alien. I keep meaning to ask him. He's from a different world or dimension or... Maybe I should ask my friend, she'd probably get it, she's all about science and you'd hope she's given it thought, what with them dating and all, right?"

She thought she saw something in Danvers' face. The faintest furrow in her eyebrows, maybe. Or she could have been imagining it. Again, she wished she had Natasha's uber-awesome spy skills, able to read a person and have them dancing at her fingertips with no effort at all.

"Anyway, it wasn't my fault," she continued, as if she hadn't noticed-or-imagined anything. "It was my friend's, both times."

"Both."

"Well, yeah. I was at the wheel when we ran into him in the desert, but she grabbed it out of my hands--I think, it was all sorts of confusing right about then--and she was _definitely_ driving when we hit him at the hospital--"

"Hospital."

"Well, yeah, where else are you gonna take someone you just hit with a van in the middle of the desert?" She made a face like she thought Danvers was missing out on something completely obvious. "We're not heartless, you know. Weren't. It was a while back. Anyway, a town pretty much got destroyed, he went back to his home planet for a while, he came back and helped save Earth, and I have a badass new job."

Which was when their meals arrived, naturally. Danvers waited until the waiter was out of earshot before finally giving more than a one-word answer. "And I thought my life was weird."

Darcy grinned.

* * *

In the end, lunch was a bust. Danvers wouldn't crack, no matter how Darcy chattered and tried to draw the discussion out. She was increasingly desperate by dessert, visions of a furious Nick Fury dancing in her head.

"Thanks for lunch, but--"

"Look, can we please just actually _talk_?" Darcy said, trailing after Danvers like a puppy as they left the restaurant. "I know you're probably freaked out, but trust me, I'm actually used to dealing with shit like this!"

"You want some professional advice?" Danvers said, stopping and turning to face her. Darcy stopped short, stunned into silence, her stomach doing flip-flops and making her regret her pasta. "Begging never works."

Darcy opened her mouth to finally let loose with something _really_ unprofessional and stress-relieving, which was when the big blue guy bumped into her. Naturally.

She almost couldn't tell that he was blue at first, but she cut off mid-response to Danvers since her subconscious apparently could and she turned again to look at him. Presumably a him. He wore bulky clothes, but she was pretty sure that he was a him. And that he was armed.

"Did you see that?" she whispered to Danvers.

"Yeah," Danvers said, suddenly on alert. "Yeah, I did. Hey, you!"

The guy apparently realized that the you in question was him and started walking faster. Danvers started after him, Darcy trailing behind. The guy started running. So did Danvers. Darcy started... jogging, maybe. She wasn't going to flat-out run after eating pasta unless there was an emergency; that was just asking for puke all over the street.

The blue guy was fast, and would have outrun Darcy any time, but Danvers was in great shape and also probably able to _fly_ , which meant that she caught up with him. "We just want to talk," she said, putting a hand on his shoulder as Darcy huffed up behind them and tried to catch her breath. Also, she thought smugly, Danvers had said _we_.

There was only a moment to consider that tiny victory, because then the blue guy punched Danvers in the face.

Darcy stood, stunned, as the force of it sent Danvers reeling. Then her brain turned on again and she threw out her right arm, made Spider-man hand, and sent her one of a kind, Tony Stark-made wrist Taser at the guy. He didn't see it coming, presumably because by now he'd turned to run away, but at least one of the tiny probes at the end of the hair-thin wires must have caught him because he went down. Darcy ran to Danvers, who was pulling herself to her feet and wiping blood from her nose and mouth. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Danvers said, pushing her away. "He's the priority, new kid."

Darcy wavered, since Danvers was technically her big priority of the day, but Fury would probably want to hear about weird armed blue guys in New York after the mess of the Chitauri and the giant stack of potential superhero files that he'd given her, so she ran to the downed blue guy. Despite all assurances that the wrist Taser was just as strong as the one she'd taken Thor out with, he was already getting to his feet, though slowly. Danvers, looking terrifying with her blood-smeared face and general pissed-off air, grabbed his too-large jacket with one hand and dragged him the rest of the way up.

Darcy beamed a gigantic fake smile at the people who were slowing down, at least one of whom was recording this on a cameraphone. "We need to be somewhere else," she told Danvers through her teeth.

"Working on it," Danvers said in the same quiet tone, except hers was scarier.

And that was when the guy ripped out of his jacket and about half of his shirt, revealing that yes, he was a shade of light blue that was actually very pretty, if weird to see on a person, and also wearing some kind of face mask.

 _Great, we've just beat up a sick mutant._ Darcy was never going to hear the end of this. From Human Resources _and_ Nick Fury now.

Of course, then there was the weapon he'd been holding under the jacket. Not a regular old gun. It looked more sci-fi. She would have thought it was fake if he hadn't pointed it at Danvers and shot at her.

Darcy screamed, but _something_ hit the weapon and caused it to go wild just as the blue guy let loose, sending the shot--some kind of energy pulse--into the ground, sending asphalt shrapnel all around. Danvers looked up, shocked, and let loose with one of those red blasts that Darcy had seen in the crappy recording, though it also hit the street as the blue guy dodged. He yelled something at them in a language that she in no way understood. Something almost bubbling. Not anything she'd ever heard, in any case. He took off at a dead run.

"He's heading for the water," Danvers said. She glanced around, looking at the people around them and gritted her teeth in frustration. "I think. I can't follow him without causing a scene."

"What, a bigger one than we just did?"

Danvers sighed. "Yeah."

"Flying blonde lady plus blue guy might be a bit much for one day, huh?" Darcy said mock-sympathetically, picturing the chewing out that Fury would give her when this showed up on the news. Or on YouTube, more likely.

Danvers looked annoyed, considered the direction that the blue guy had gone in, and then nodded. "You think your friend Thor is an alien, huh?"

"Maybe. I'm not a hundred percent sure on that."

"Walk with me to the nearest pharmacy and I'll tell you a little story about one of my coworkers and a complete and utter freak accident, then."

"Oh hey, your coworker's an alien, too?"

Danvers smiled faintly.

As Danvers started talking in a low, tired voice, Darcy listened with half of her attention and started wondering with the other half: who had hit the blue guy's weapon and kept it from shooting Danvers? Did Fury have someone tailing her? Not that she didn't blame him for not trusting her at this job just yet--just look at this clusterfuck.

She wondered if whoever it was would be so kind as to stay behind and get questioned by the cops, letting her off the hook for that. Or if, being SHIELD, she was just completely above that now.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which old friends reappear, the Internet is usually bad for job security, and Thor is the authority on all things blue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading!
> 
> There's a content-specific note at the bottom of the page, but it's nothing major, I think. Just more of a reference for mostly- or only-movieverse fans.

Darcy looked out her window to where a suit of armor currently hovered above the special awesome landing pad specifically for Iron Man armor landings. It didn't _look_ like Tony's armor, but she hadn't seen him in a couple of days and supposed that he could have been tinkering with it. He did that sometimes, and it was a nice change from upgrading things that didn't actually need it.

She dragged herself off of her new futon and over to the elevator, grabbed her tablet, and hopped into the elevator. "Common floor, JARVIS," she said.

"Yes, Ms. Lewis."

She stepped out and glanced up to see Tony at the coffee pot, pouring himself a mug. "That was fast. Pour me some too, will you? I'm about to fall asleep on my feet here."

"What was fast?" Tony asked, obligingly reaching for another clean mug.

"You coming in from out--" She looked over, pointing with her free hand to the balcony, where--yeah. The suit of Iron Man armor was still out there, being taken off of someone who wasn't Tony Stark. She groaned. "Oh God, there's more of you?"

Tony looked annoyed. "You can get your own coffee if you're going to be snippy," he said.

"I'm really not in the mood for this shit," she said, walking over and sliding the tablet with the YouTube video from the day before over for him to look over. "Busy stewing over my disasters. Swanky apartment aside, I am _really_ missing just being a cube rat right about now."

He picked up the tablet and pressed play, taking a thoughtful sip of his drink as he did. Darcy helped herself to the coffee pot as the guy who was definitely not Tony Stark but still had the armor let himself in and looked around. "Looks like you've been busy," he said.

"Looks like you owe me a late fee on the suit," Tony said, not looking up.

"Looks like I'm _so_ incredibly confused. Who're you?" Darcy asked.

"Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes," he said, holding out a hand for her to shake and politely not looking at her bunny slippers.

"Darcy Lewis, SHIELD liaison and downstairs neighbor." Rhodes had a really firm handshake, she noted.

"And team mascot," Tony added in.

"Am not." She stuck her tongue out at him.

"And you're part of..." Rhodes glanced around the room, which Darcy took to indicate the Avengers as a whole.

She sighed. "Liaison. Not like an actual part of the team. I try to get them to stop being _jackasses_ \--" she directed this at Tony, who gave her a royal sort of wave as he gulped from his mug-- "every once in a while and get them moving in the direction my boss thinks they need to go."

"And how's that going for you?" Rhodes asked with a knowing sort of wry smile.

"Do I look like I'm happy, well-adjusted, or well-rested? It took me a month to even get my apartment unpacked. And that was with other people finally doing it."

"Give it at least that long over again," Rhodes said, sounding like he knew what he was talking about. "Either you'll adjust to your new schedule or you'll go crazy."

"I miss college."

"Anyway," Tony said, sliding Darcy's tablet back over to her, "Rhodey was just coming to see me about... what? You don't exactly drop by for movie night any more--"

"This is the opposite coast from where I live, some of us can't fly anywhere on a whim without paperwork--"

"--and since I doubt you're coming to return my suit--"

" _My_ suit--"

"--what's this all about?"

Rhodes gave Tony an exasperated look, then turned back and gave Darcy a pointed one. Darcy shrugged. "He's probably gonna have to tell me so I can report it back to Fury anyway," Darcy said. "But if it makes you feel any better, I can sit on the couch and pretend to not listen while you two hug it out."

Tony raised his eyebrows at Rhodes in a mock-helpless expression. Rhodes' mouth twisted in exasperation. "There's been a series of hit-and-run attacks on some shipyards along the West Coast."

"And what, turning the terror alert up to eleven isn't working?"

"It's not a threat we're familiar with," Rhodes said way more patiently than Darcy would have in his position, probably. "It's looking more like your... thing. At least, your current thing."

"Aliens? Guys in costumes?" asked Darcy. "And how come SHIELD hasn't sent me anything about this?"

"It could be one or the other, and I'd expect to be hearing about it soon if I were you," Rhodes said. "I'm here in an... unofficial capacity."

"You're sneaking," Tony said in delight.

"I'm calling in a favor from a friend," Rhodes said, sounding distinctly unhappy. "And you do owe me in a big way, Tony."

"I let you keep the suit."

"That's a good start. Now come back with me and help me figure this out before it spills over."

Tony looked at Darcy with big puppy eyes. "Can I, Mom? Can I go over and play at Rhodey's? You won't tell Dad, right?"

"God, you're annoying. I'll have to report back to Fury, but if you fly away like, now?" She shrugged. "What can I do? It's not like I can fuck up any worse today."

"How about an hour from now?"

Darcy grabbed her mug, the coffee still hot and steamy, and turned to go back to the elevator. "No skin off my ass. Call Pepper."

"You're the best, boss."

"You can tell Fury that when he fires me."

* * *

She sat waiting for Peter's class to let out, sucking at Angry Birds in the meantime. There really was no use moping around the tower. The least she could do was mope outside, in decent weather, and in good company.

Of course, all the positives so far didn't outweigh the negative that she was positive that she was going to get fired. So she was fairly distracted and couldn't get the goddamn birds to do what they were supposed to and kill the stupid fucking pigs.

"Darcy?"

She looked up to see Peter, looking tired but happy to see her. "Surprise."

"It sure is. Aren't you supposed to be herding supercats right about now?"

"I gave myself the afternoon off." She shrugged. "I figured I deserved something nice. And since I'm technically sort of your boss--"

"You're actually not, I'm pretty sure you're more of an adviser."

"--I'm giving you the afternoon off, too." She grabbed him by the wrist and tugged him along behind her. "C'mon, we're doing something fun."

"But--what if--"

"There's a whole bunch of people in a tower who are exactly as capable as you of handling shit. Most of 'em even have the afternoon free. Or I'll text Jessica or call Heroes for Hire. I'll figure out _something._ We're going on a date. I'll even let you talk science at me," she said magnanimously, hailing a cab.

Peter brightened. "And you'll listen?"

"Oh yeah. I mean, I can't promise I'll _understand_."

"I appreciate the tremendous sacrifice you're making on my behalf." He grinned, shoving his backpack into the cab behind her. "Also, you giving me the afternoon off. I really, really appreciate that."

"What's the use of having the job if I don't use the perks, right?" She told the cab driver to take them to the Natural History museum--not _completely_ science but Peter still tended to lose his shit there in a happy, comfortable way--and leaned against his shoulder. "You'll love me even if I ask you to help me re-pack up my apartment and move somewhere tiny and disappointing, right?"

"Why? What happened?"

"Nothing... yet. It's kind of a long story. I'll tell you when we get there. But I'm pretty sure I screwed up and I'm going to be really fired really fast. I'm not even sure I'll be back in the analyst monkey pool."

Peter scoffed. "It can't be that bad."

"It might be that bad."

He slid her off of his shoulder and put an arm around her. "I can call Aunt May and tell her we need a comfort food night later this week, if you want. She likes you."

"You're nice."

"I'm the nicest." He nodded agreeably. "Except Aunt May's nicer."

"She really is."

Once they reached the museum, in the comforting buzz of conversation all around, Darcy felt okay spilling a condensed version of the semi-failed interview with Carol Danvers and the YouTube video that was in no way subtle or covert.

"But if Fury wanted subtle and covert, he shouldn't have sent _me_ ," she finished up with, crossing her arms defiantly. She'd decided on that as her last line of defense when the inevitable grilling came up.

Peter grimaced. "Yeah, that's... well. The Internet is forever."

"Yep."

"Did anyone get hurt?"

"Danvers got punched in the face, but I don't think the blue guy did any more damage to anyone else. Maybe he shoved some people out of the way when he took off, but nothing serious. She seemed okay after she washed off the blood, too--apparently she's a lot harder to hurt now, so the guy must have hit like a truck."

"Property damage?"

"The street got shot up. I've seen worse."

"Electro threw a car at me last week and it ended up on an apartment roof. Worse happens."

"And I really don't like thinking about that."

"But it happens. Nobody's told me to go home yet." He shook his head in amazement. "Which still weirds me out, by the way."

"But you're useful," Darcy pointed out. "You fight crime."

"You got Clint Barton and Natasha Romanov to watch teen girl movies and help you unpack," Peter said.

Darcy snorted. "That was easy."

"I couldn't do it."

"I bet Fury could."

Peter snorted. "I'd pay to see that. Anyway, what is it you're always insisting? Appearing is most of being?"

"I don't think appearing to not be fired would un-fire me."

"But you're not fired _yet_ ," Peter pointed out. "You're just assuming you are. You're stressed, you're tired, you really need a backrub--"

"I do."

"But not in public. Anyway, once you relax a little and get some perspective, you'll see it's really not so bad." He grinned lopsidedly. "So would this be a good time to tell you that both the car _and_ building's owners and their insurance companies are going to be contacting SHIELD in the next month since they don't know my secret identity and Electro got away?"

Darcy groaned.

* * *

The SHIELD summons came later than Darcy expected, a full day after her and Peter's trip to the museum.

Thankfully, the timeframe given by the message--"ASAP"--didn't give her enough time for her stomach to _really_ work itself into knots. Just a few little ones. Which were bad enough, but she'd been stressed enough recently that really, it was just business as usual now. Though she did start getting worried when she wasn't escorted to Fury's office. She was somewhere completely unfamiliar. Well, not completely. Same hallway.

The agent escorting her turned the corner and opened the door. Inside, Maria Hill stood waiting.

And Thor. He grinned when he saw her, and despite all the worry of the past _ever_ , she grinned back. You just couldn't help it around him when he did that. "Hey," she said, coming in for a hug as the escorting agent stepped back out and closed the door. Private meeting, then. "What're you doing here? I thought you were supposed to be back on Asgard for at least another month."

"That's what we're here to discuss, Ms. Lewis," Hill said, taking her seat. Her desk was less imposing than Fury's. More practical, though still without any of the home-y touches Darcy would associate with spending a lot of time there. Darcy sat in the only other free chair in front of the desk.

"What's this about?" she asked, feeling bewildered. She'd spent the last two days building herself up to be fired, or at least to be yelled at by Fury. This was... she wasn't sure if it was a relief or even scarier.

Hill looked briefly irritated. "I'll get to that if you can hold off on questions. We've seen the video of your recruiting attempt."

Darcy deflated in her seat and opened her mouth to defend herself. Hill shot her a look. Darcy preemptively shut up.

"We can discuss pretty much everything else involved in that later," Hill said. "For now, the man--presumably a man--that you encountered is what we're here to discuss. This does _not_ leave the room until I or Colonel Fury tell you otherwise, is that clear?"

"It's already on YouTube," Darcy said, still off-guard. Hill looked less than impressed. "Crystal clear," she said hastily. No wonder Hill was second in command. It was like she had absorbed Nick Fury powers of intimidation.

"This isn't the first time we've encountered one of these blue humanoids, though this is the clearest we've seen one captured on film," Hill said. "They've been making themselves known over the past month and a half along various international coastal locations, usually only being caught in brief glimpses before or after disruptions."

"Disruptions like..." Darcy prompted.

Hill's lips thinned. "I believe you sent Doctor Banner out to survey the aftermath of one and assist with cleanup a week ago."

Darcy's eyes widened. "The thing in the North Sea? That was them?"

"Presumably."

"So why's Thor here?" Darcy turned to him. "Not that I'm not glad to see you. I know Jane'll be happy."

He looked more somber than she remembered seeing him in a really long time. Since New Mexico, actually. "Some time ago, I asked Heimdall--the guardian of Asgard--to keep watch over my friends and compatriots. These mysterious beings bear a similarity to--" He stopped, glanced over at Hill, who looked annoyed. Apparently she'd heard it before. He set his jaw. "Certain beings that I have familiarity with."

"You know blue guys?" Darcy asked.

"Jotun are of a similar hue, though much larger." He looked pained for a second, just long enough for Darcy to be positive she hadn't imagined it before he continued. "And Dark Elves."

Darcy blinked. She shook her head. "Wait. Elves? Like _Lord of the Rings_ elves?"

Thor looked annoyed. "They are dangerous and warlike beings--"

"And they're elves!"

"Lewis," Hill snapped. Darcy shut up.

"Heimdall has not been aware of the Dark Elves planning to move against Midgard, but he has been tricked before," Thor continued. "Thus, I thought it best to cut short my plans and bring warning. Though upon seeing this recording, I do not think that this, at least, is a Dark Elf." He leaned forward, looking pensive. "It does not speak as they do, nor is its weapon one I have encountered before."

"Do all Dark Elves speak the same language?" Hill asked. "Could they have access to weapons technology that you don't know about?"

"It is a possibility," Thor said grudgingly. "I cannot speak for the entirety of their race. But the ones I have faced in battle neither looked nor sounded like that."

"So we're back to square one," Hill said, leaning back with a sigh. "Lewis, did you notice anything useful?"

She thought back to that terrifying, brief encounter. "I Tased him and he was back up in, like, seconds. And Tony claims that this thing's just as good as the police-issue kind." She tapped her wrist-Taser bracelet.

Thor scoffed. "You must not have hit it properly."

Darcy definitely detected wounded alien god pride there. "I totally did," she said, sitting straighter. "Both charges used. I checked later. And he hit Danvers hard enough to do some damage. She told me after that one of the side effects of her powers is that she's a hell of a lot harder to hurt now. Whatever this guy is, he's strong and he's hard to knock down."

"I wish you'd got his weapon," Hill said.

"Which reminds me, did you talk to my babysitter?"

"Your what?" Hill asked.

"You saw the video, someone shot his gun-thingy right when he was about to shoot me. I thought it was you guys."

"If it was us, we'd have had him in custody instead of plastered all over the internet," Hill said, irritated.

Darcy decided that silence was the best defense.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For reference, the Dark Elves that I'm working off of look more like [this](http://www.comicvine.com/dark-elves/65-56571/all-images/108-272173/alflyse/105-950889/). From production stills of "Thor: The Dark World", it looks like the movieverse Dark Elves will look... probably less so like that.
> 
> There will probably also be less Elvish Ticklers.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which worrying leads nowhere good, there are more mysteries afoot, and Darcy mostly moves backwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading, and I hope you're still enjoying this!

Darcy still felt dazed when she got back to the tower, Thor in tow. She wasn't fired. And elves might be running around New York City. Also the rest of the world.

"I need to call Jane," she said as they made their way into the lobby. "She'll be thrilled. Oh, unless you wanted to surprise her. She'd like that, too."

"Which do you think she would prefer?" Thor asked, sounding suddenly unsure instead of like a big superhero alien god guy.

"If it were me? Surprise. But since her schedule's all over the place, maybe a call in advance would work. Oh, hey! Erik's back in town. He'd be happy to see you, too, but not in a date way."

"Erik? You've seen him? How is he?"

Darcy noted that to the current receptionist's credit, he didn't even blink at the giant guy in armor carrying a hammer walking through the lobby. Then again, Thor was pretty recognizable when he was fresh from Asgard. And he wasn't wearing the cape. "He's all right. Busy, I guess, but he helped me unpack my stuff. Actually, I didn't do much."

"That is quite heartening to hear," Thor said as the elevator closed and started moving them up. JARVIS greeted them quietly, leaving them to their conversation. "I was most concerned for him after the Chitauri invasion."

"He was here for that?" Darcy asked. "He never mentioned it."

Thor gave her a weird sidelong--okay, side-and-down-long--glance and looked away. "If he has not spoken of it, then I will not," he said.

"That's about as good as saying that something bad happened," Darcy said, suddenly worried.

Thor didn't look back down at her or say anything else until the door opened a few seconds later, when he grinned hugely and boomed a greeting at anyone present. Darcy stayed back, crossing her arms. "My floor, JARVIS," she said.

"Of course, Ms. Lewis."

"Something bad happened to Erik, didn't it?"

"Rhetorical, or not?"

"I'd like to get an answer from someone around here before I go bug Erik, yeah."

The door opened on her floor, but she waited. JARVIS never sighed, since he was a robot--artificial intelligence, whatever--but she thought she could sense some kind of hesitation there. "The circumstances of the Chitauri invasion were difficult for many, Doctor Selvig included."

It wasn't an answer, exactly, but it did confirm that something had happened to him. Darcy rubbed her forehead. She was getting a stress headache.

She stepped into her apartment and stopped, thinking. Things to do: call Jane. Call Erik. Call Jessica. Find time to hang out with Peter. Find out when Bruce would be back from the thingy in the North Sea so she could talk to him about the maybe-elves. Find out when Tony would be back for the same reason, because suddenly that whole conversation seemed like it could be part of the bigger picture here. Figure out if elves were really suddenly attacking Earth, and what exactly she was supposed to be doing if that were the case.

Right. Start with something easy. She took out her phone and called Jane.

And got Jane's voice mail. Wonderful. "Hey, former boss, pick up. I think you're gonna want to call me back ASAP. It's only good news." She thought it over and added, "On second thought, just come over. Call me before you do, I want to be sure I'm home." And more importantly, that Thor hadn't gone off smashing elf faces first. That done, she hung up and debated the next step.

There was Jessica, Luke, and their friend Danny, of course. She needed to get this business with their files out of the way, and most importantly, she just wanted to hang out. But maybe not so soon after the disaster of the Danvers meeting. Darcy slumped down on her futon and decided that it could wait until the dust from that had settled just a little more.

Which left elves, Erik, and Peter. Two birds with one text message, maybe. Her fingers flew across her phone's touchscreen.

The elves could wait just a little longer, maybe. It wasn't like Bruce and Tony were back yet to say what they'd seen. And besides, Hill had told her that nothing from the meeting would leave the room. She wasn't slacking at all.

* * *

"Stop fiddling with that," Darcy hissed.

Peter dropped his hand from the SHIELD visitor badge. "Do you think it's got any weird tracking devices in it?"

"Probably. Don't touch anything."

"Webbing isn't touching."

Darcy glared at Peter, who smiled innocently at her just before the door to the SHIELD research wing opened. "Surprise," she said to a pleased but surprised looking Erik. "We brought snacks."

"Just like old times," he said, beaming and pulling her into a hug, careful not to squash the bag of junk food. "Good to see you too, Peter."

"Always a pleasure," he said, shaking Erik's hand.

"Not that I'm complaining, but what are you doing here? I thought you were busy," Erik said, turning to go back inside the research wing and waving for them to follow. "Things let up?"

"Getting the hang of time management," Darcy said. "Kind of. Also, I wanted to see how Jane was, see if she can get some time away to come visit. Thor's back early. Don't tell her, I want it to be a surprise."

Erik nodded, half-cheerful, half-distracted. "How is he? It seems so strange to ask that about an extra-dimensional being, but--"

"But once you see 'em in a hospital gown, it kind of ruins the illusion," Darcy said, nodding. "He's okay. Busy, but who isn't these days?"

"Got that right," Erik said, running a hand through his hair. "We've been seeing all sorts of activity lately..."

He trailed off and Darcy tried not to think _elves_. She smiled brightly. "That's why we're here! Making sure that you guys are getting enough food."

"Loosely defined," Peter butted in. "I'm still not sure Twinkies count."

"It's all part of the process," Darcy said, tapping him lightly on the shoulder. "You're a scientist, I'm surprised you don't know that."

"To be fair, I'm not even done with my undergrad degree."

"Living on nothing but coffee and processed sugar must be something they teach in grad school these days," Erik said, waving them on.

Peter started to follow, but Darcy held back. "Peter, you run those up to Jane, okay? I was wondering if I could talk to you," she told Erik.

Peter nodded and took the bags of food. She'd explained a little of her worries to him on the ride over, and he was content to run interference for her.

Erik gave her a bemused look and walked back over. "More job problems? You get used to the stress eventually."

"Not... exactly." She felt weird, being the one to ask _him_ if everything was all right. Back in New Mexico, she'd been Jane's keeper, yeah, but had occasionally needed to remind him to do the necessary things like eating and sleeping. But not nearly as often. He was experienced enough to have perspective, she thought, and usually acted as her backup when Jane tried to "just _one_ more equation" her way out of things.

Maybe not the team dad down there, but the team uncle or big brother or something, definitely.

Just bite the bullet and do it. "So between you freaking out at my apartment a while back and Thor saying that he was worried about you... now I'm kind of worried, too," she said.

She definitely wasn't imagining how Erik stiffened up, even though he tried to laugh it off. Badly. "Thor's worried about me? I feel like I should be flattered."

"Cut the crap, Erik. Seriously, what happened? Are you okay? I really don't like being left in the dark here."

"It's nothing you need to worry about," he said, trying to wave her off. "All over and done with."

"Except for the part where _you freaked out in my apartment_ and Thor the alien god of thunder and whatever is asking about you."

"I wouldn't call it 'freaking out,'" he said, irritated now.

"Whatever you want to call it," she said, waving a hand through the air in a cutting gesture. "Seriously."

"I'm just fine," he snapped. And then, starting to walk back to the main research area, "Thanks for asking."

"It's what I'm here for," she shot back, just as snippy.

* * *

She put on a happy face for the remainder of the time she and Peter stayed at the lab, which turned out to be mercifully short. Jane was too distracted to notice the giant wall of sudden coolness between Darcy and Erik, or that Peter was very obviously trying to get them all to make small talk. She did promise--vaguely--to drop by the tower at some point soon, though she shooed them off after less than a half hour, saying that she had to get back to work before she lost the thread on whatever astrophysics mystery she was chasing down.

And then Peter had to run off, Spider-manning his way to a robbery in progress. So Darcy was left to grump around her apartment alone. Just when she thought she was getting the hang of one thing, some other goddamned thing popped up to bother her. This sucked.

She started pacing in front of her window and checked her email on her phone. The usual business in her SHIELD inbox, nothing new there. No checking in from Tony or Bruce, no surprise there. She was learning that the only ones who regularly emailed her updates were Natasha (short, impersonal one-sentence emails) and Clint (long, rambling things he only sent when he was bored.) Bruce still seemed suspicious of having his movements tracked, it slipped Steve's mind to use a still-mostly-unfamiliar form of communication, and Tony just never bothered. Darcy didn't think that Thor had access to email in Asgard.

And on her personal email, just as she was going to send a message to Jessica asking her if she was free later that week--hello, what was that? She thought it might be spam, since it lacked a sender's name, but the subject line-- _stop pacing and open this_ \--stopped her dead in her tracks. She looked around, even though if there had been anyone in her apartment, either JARVIS would have said something or she'd probably be dead by now. JARVIS would have said something. Right?

Her hands shook as she opened the message, and she started breathing again. "You son of a bitch," she hissed.

_Meet me at the same place as last time. Tomorrow at 8 am sharp. Agent Kay_

Darcy's eyes narrowed. Really. All this shit going on, and now spy games?

"Ms. Lewis," came JARVIS's voice, startling her.. "Doctor Banner has returned. I believe you set a note in the system telling me to let you know?"

"Right," she said, gritting her teeth. In all honesty, she'd forgotten making that note in her phone when Bruce had left. But business was business, and she could at least make some progress on _some_ front. She headed for the elevator and exited on the main floor.

Bruce wasn't there yet. Either he had stopped off on his own floor, or he had just entered the building. Either way, Darcy decided to make herself comfortable. She debated pouring herself a drink, decided that since she was no Tony Stark it would probably be best to conduct business clear-headed, and grabbed a bottled water from the fridge.

It took a few minutes, but eventually one of the elevator doors opened and Bruce wandered in, looking more rumpled and tired than usual. He glanced over and waved. "JARVIS said you were in here," he said.

"Yep. Sorry to be the buzzkill around here."

He looked resigned and made his way over to the couch, slumping down on it. "Can I at least get a drink and a snack first?"

She rummaged around in the kitchen and called over her shoulder, "Cookies and a Coke okay, or do you want JARVIS to get you real food?"

"I'll take what I can get."

She tossed over the cookies, walked over the Coke, and said, "I'll get JARVIS to order a pizza. In the meantime, junk food."

She plopped down on the couch and crossed her arms, watching him. He raised an eyebrow. She waited. He waited back, though with added eating and drinking action.

It turned out that Darcy couldn't out-patient Bruce Banner. "So?" she asked.

"So what?"

"Was it elves?"

Okay, maybe she should have waited until after he'd finished taking that sip of Coke to ask that, because it went _all_ over. "Was it _what_?"

"Elves," she said. "Blue ones."

He stared at her like he wasn't sure if she was joking or not. "Blue elves."

"I'm not making it up," she said defensively. "Thor said--"

"Thor?"

"Yeah, he's back, probably wandering around somewhere, _anyway_. He said that elves are blue, or something like that. And the guy I ran into the other day was blue--"

Bruce held up a hand. "Just--hold on. What blue guy?"

Darcy looked at him over the top of her glasses. "Last I checked, I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to be debriefing _you_."

"You're making pretty much no sense, which is making that difficult."

She huffed. "Beginning at the beginning? There are blue guys. Thor says they might be elves. I ran into one of them a couple of days ago. And Hill said that whatever I sent you off to help with might have been caused by them. So. Did you see any blue elves or not?"

Bruce sighed. "No, Darcy, I didn't see any little blue elves."

Darcy frowned. "I didn't say they were little. He was actually kind of huge. Not like, Hulk huge, but MMA-fighter big, definitely."

"I didn't see any MMA elves, either," Bruce said dryly. "Mostly I just saw a lot of wreckage and spent the last week trying to contain that damage."

"Ugh," she said, rolling her eyes and flopping back. "And now we're right back to square-negative-one. Maybe Tony'll have something interesting for me when he gets back."

"You sent Tony off to fight elves?"

"I didn't know they were elves at the time. Hey, did you know that elves have guns?"

"Well, that figures," Bruce said.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which lunch goes badly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading!

At seven the next morning, Darcy walked into a Starbucks walking distance from her old apartment. Maybe not seven exactly, but close enough. She narrowed her eyes and looked around.

And at the table she was pretty sure she'd sat at last time, the night before she'd accepted her current job, was the guy she was looking for. This time he'd ordered drinks.

"So," she said, sliding into the chair across from him. "Why'd I have to drag my ass all the way out here this early?"

Coulson raised an eyebrow. "I believe you were going to be meeting your former roommate later today. I don't think it's too far out of your schedule."

"Goddammit, you're not even working for SHIELD any more, are you? Aren't you supposed to stop doing the secret agent shit once you're officially dead?"

"We all have our hobbies," he said, not cracking any sort of expression other than neutrally pleasant.

"My nana took up knitting when she retired."

"I've never been a fan. Ms. Lewis, we need to talk."

"Yeah, I got that." She huffed and sniffed at her drink. "Let me guess, you know exactly how many sugars and what kind of milk I take."

"It's in your file," he said. "This is about the blue humanoids."

She looked up at him and put the coffee cup down before she'd even taken a sip. "The elves."

"I don't believe they're elves. Neither does Director Fury."

"You've seen him? Where's he been?"

"That's not relevant to the conversation. What _is_ important is that whatever they are, they're from this world."

"And you're, like, really sure of that."

"Reasonably sure."

"So I'm asking again, because I seem to be asking this a lot lately: why am I not getting this through all the ways I _should_ be?" She tapped her phone emphatically. "Instead of through bullshit clandestine meetings with the Return of the Living Dead."

"Director Fury will share what information he deems necessary _when_ he deems it necessary."

"What, like you not being dead?" She leaned forward, propping her head on her hands. "When's that one gonna be necessary?"

Coulson looked annoyed. "Point taken. In any case, it was decided that discreetly steering you, and by extension the Avengers toward a domestic origin instead of an extraterrestrial one could be necessary. So here I am."

"And you don't want SHIELD proper finding out about this, or what? Left hand doesn't want the right hand to know what the hell is going on?"

He smiled blandly. "Now you're getting it."

She glared at him. "I really hate this. I can't say that enough."

"I'd say that you're doing all right. Except for the YouTube thing." He frowned slightly at her. "But you'll get better."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," she said sarcastically. "And that's exactly it. This. The secrecy thing."

"Ms. Lewis--"

"Shut up and do my job, I know. I haven't told anyone about you." She jabbed a finger at him. "Don't think I haven't been tempted."

"I appreciate it. I know exactly how hard it is to keep secrets of this magnitude."

She paused again, still only the barest inch from drinking her coffee. "What else are you keeping secret?" she asked, not expecting an answer.

He smiled blandly.

* * *

Jessica sat on the stoop of their old apartment, thumbing through a notebook. Darcy supposed that it was still technically Jessica's apartment, since only one of them had moved out recently. The old place felt familiar and comfortable, even if it was only the front of the building. Even with the giant roaches and tiny rooms, nobody had wanted anything of any real importance of her while she'd lived there.

Well. You can't go home again and all that bullshit, she supposed. She pulled her earbuds out and waved, even though Jess wasn't looking up. "Hey."

"Look who dropped in," Jessica said, shutting the notebook and standing up. "How's the big leagues treating you?"

"Like shit," Darcy said, wrinkling her nose and pulling Jessica in for a hug. "How's school going?"

"Like shit," Jessica said. "Let's get the fuck out of here. I'm starving."

No fancy or even fancy-ish restaurants this time; they went for burgers and ate out in the open. "It's all just such a load of bullshit," Darcy said around a mouthful of fries. "I think I'm getting the hang of it and bam, everything shifts around."

Jessica shrugged. "That's creepy government agencies for you," she said completely unsympathetically. "You want to still be doing whatever the fuck you did before?"

Darcy thought of the hours and hours of combing through emails and documents. "I got regular sleep most nights," she said, still not quite willing to stop grumbling just yet.

"Look, when am I ever the one who says to look on the bright side? But look on the fucking bright side."

"Well, if it's coming from you..."

They stopped when they heard a noise coming from the distance, just weird enough and loud enough to hear over the sounds of traffic and construction. And screams. Lots of screams.

"What the hell's that?" Jessica said, putting her half-eaten burger down and standing up.

"I know that noise," Darcy said. "I've heard it... God, where've I heard it..."

As it got closer--and the screaming, always the screaming, which would be a really good indication to run if she wasn't so intent on figuring out what the fuck was going on--it got maddeningly more familiar.

"We should go," Jessica said, food forgotten.

"Yeah," Darcy said, seeing the crowd start to scoot in that hesitant skipping way that always preceded a flat-out run in her experience. 

And then a blue not-elf jumped out from around the next building over, with one of those big weird not-quite-gun weapons. And then five more. And then a lot more.

"Oh, shit," Darcy said. "I knew that sounded familiar."

They wore the same masks that the one she’d run into had, but instead of wearing oversized street clothes, these wore some kind of rubbery looking armor. And they seemed to really, really like shooting to cause chaos, firing at people and buildings alike. Darcy and Jessica ran into the nearest restaurant, wincing and shrieking along with everyone else inside as a blast hit the door.

"Get everyone under cover," Jessica said, shoving Darcy behind her and balling her other hand into a fist.

" _You_ get everyone under cover," Darcy said, shoving Jessica with one shoulder and grabbing for her phone. " Better yet, get people inside. I've got calls to make."

"Fucking Smurfs are attacking and you're--" Jessica stopped, smacked her forehead, and shook her head. "Right. I'll start getting people inside."

"Be right there, I promise," Darcy said, ducking under a table and sending out a mass text to the Avengers, doing a mental head count. Tony was still on the West Coast, so that was a huge no. Clint had been called away on super secret SHIELD business the day before, so he was also probably out. Natasha was a maybe. Bruce was a probably, provided that he noticed the alert and wasn't wrapped up in science. Steve was a definitely, though she wasn't sure how soon. Thor was a definitely, though the same went for him. And Peter was a definitely, though she was pretty sure he was in a lab right now. And SHIELD proper... she had no idea what exactly they would do.

Inspiration struck her, and she yelled over to Jessica, "I need Luke's phone number!"

Jessica stopped just behind the doorway. "Oh hell no. You are _not_ bringing--"

"Heroes for Hire, right? I'm goddamned hiring them. Gimme their number or I'll look it up myself."

Jessica glared, but told her the number, which Darcy dialed, standing and peering outside. The not-elves were taking cover behind abandoned cars, but every now and then one popped up and fired a shot. She winced.

She heard Luke's deep voice answer. "Heroes for Hire--"

"Luke? It's Darcy. Uh, Jessica's ex-roommate. I kind of need to hire you guys."

She could hear the confusion in the pause on the other end of the line, and filled in the silence. "Look, it's an emergency. I'm totally good for the fee."

"What's the situation?" Luke asked cautiously.

"Army of blue guys trying to kill us and everyone around us. Probably not us in specific, they're pretty happy to shoot at anyone who gets near. You in?"

"You good for the fee?"

"I can absolutely promise that."

"I'll call Iron Fist and we'll be on our way. Where you at?"

She gave him the address, warned him about the blue-person perimeter slowly creeping forward, and hung up. "They're on their way," she said to Jessica as she creeped toward the door.

Jessica held a chair as a shield/weapon and looked around the blown-open door frame outside. The street directly in front of them was still choked with people trying to get out of cars, move out of the way, and in a few disheartening cases, shove people behind them in the scramble to be somewhere else.

"Fuck it, I'm not waiting," Darcy said, grabbing a chair of her own.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Jessica said. "You're not going out there--"

"I kind of am. Back in a--"

"Don't fucking say it, don't you watch _any_ movies?" Jessica dithered, set her jaw, and said, "Stay behind me."

They stepped out and started grabbing people, shoving them through the doorframe, and yelling at them to stay down and stay put. Darcy made sure that her right arm was relatively free, even though if the blue guys were all like the ones she'd run into, the most she could hope for from a blast of wrist Taser was a spare few seconds to act. Run, probably. Or fly, in Jessica's case.

Darcy screeched as a blast from one of the blue guys' weapons hit just a few inches from her feet, spraying cement from the sidewalk everywhere, hitting her legs and catching a few other people close by. "Son of a _bitch,_ " she gasped, stepping back inside the door. She checked the damage--bloodied legs, mostly her knees, but nothing she couldn't deal with. "Got anything to throw back at them?" she asked Jessica, who had come back in, presumably to check on her.

"I can chuck chairs at them, but I don't know how good my aim is, and we've only got so many chairs," Jessica said grimly. "I'm hard to hurt, but I'm not invincible. How long ago did you put out your calls?"

"Couldn't have been more than a couple of minutes," Darcy said, steeling herself to go back out.

"I think I can help."

Darcy turned, a bright strained smile at the ready, but it curled up in shock. "Co--Kay?" She corrected herself at the last second.

Coulson stood behind them, looking immaculate even in street clothes, disguise-beard neatly trimmed. "I was in the neighborhood."

Jessica's eyes flicked between them, then back outside. "If he wants to help, he can help," she said, and then muttered, "For all the good it'll do."

"I'll provide cover fire," Coulson said, pulling out a pistol from his jacket.

Jessica and Darcy eyed it. Darcy wondered what else he had hidden. Jessica shrugged. "Works for me," Darcy said. "Jessica, I hate to ask, but this is an emergency. Can you--?"

Jessica chewed at the inside of her cheek, looked at the panic outside and the still-shooting blue guys, and nodded. "Guess I'd better," she said. "You've got the ground covered?"

Darcy tapped her wrist Taser. "I'll do my best."

"Don't make me regret this, Lewis." Turning, Jessica ran out the door, tangled hair whipping, and jumped out--and up. Darcy held her breath despite herself. She'd never seen her former roommate fly before. Land, yes, but flying was new.

"We've got to hurry, Ms. Lewis," Coulson said, making his way to the door's frame. "I can't be here when help arrives."

"How'd I know you were gonna say that?" Darcy grumbled, taking a breath, and running back out.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which shit goes down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading, leaving comments, kudos, etc.! I hope you're still having fun with this story!
> 
> So, kind of a warning: this chapter's heavy on action and things get a little heavy for Darcy from here on out. Just FYI.

Once she was out on the sidewalk again, Darcy started grabbing people and shoving them inside, yelling for people to follow her and keep calm. She could hear gunfire as well as the weird pulsing noise of the blue guys' weapons; the police were out in force by now. Closer by, she could hear the loud, steady firing from Coulson, methodical and hopefully doing _some_ good.

She led the first group of about ten or so people back to the rapidly crowding restaurant. "I think we're about full here," she told Coulson. "I'm gonna see if I can start shoving people into whatever's in the next door over."

"Good idea," Coulson said, looking around the door frame and firing off another shot.

Darcy's ears rang from the noise, but she made a show of smiling brightly and looking like she had this under _complete_ control. It was hard to do, since one lens of her glasses had been cracked at some point, her jeans were torn and spattered with blood from the knees down, and the messy ponytail she'd pulled her hair into felt lopsided. She clapped her hands like an elementary school teacher.

"Hey everyone," she said, raising her voice to be heard above _abso-fucking-lutely everything else_ , "I'm Darcy. And I know this looks really bad, but help's on the way. I'm talking _big_ help, okay? Like, Avengers help."

"How do you know that?" one suspicious looking guy near her said.

"Because I texted them, and I know for a fact that Tony Stark can't go five minutes without checking his phone," she said, even though she knew that he _could_ and he wasn't even one of the ones she was counting on to be here, but it got a few shaky laughs. She grinned a big cocky grin. "And Thor's a good friend of mine. We go way back. So sit here, stay calm, and don't answer the door for any blue weirdos, got it?"

She turned and nodded at Coulson before she'd even finished the sentence, jogging back out the door and to the next doorway. It turned out to be a Starbucks.

"Figures," Darcy muttered to herself, poking her head in and grinning manically. "Hey, everyone! You guys doing okay?"

"There's a girl flying around up there," a kid in a Captain America hoodie said, pointing out the window.

Darcy glanced out to where Jessica darted across the sky, carrying something big and humanoid, which she dropped from very high up, and winced. "Yeah, she's one of the good guys," she said. "I'm gonna be bringing more people in. Don't worry, there's lots of people out there trying to help. And the Avengers are on their way."

She darted back outside, where a familiar brick wall in a yellow T-shirt and sunglasses was waiting for her, accompanied by a lean guy in green with a yellow bandana/mask hiding most of his face. "Hey, Luke," she called, waving him over.

"What the hell's going on?" he yelled back, looking pissed off and unconcerned by the debris being knocked around by the blue guys' weapons. "We had to come in on foot."

"They don't have this place blocked off yet?!" Darcy said, outraged.

Luke looked a little mollified. "We had to take a different route," his friend said. Danny, according to his file, though they'd never actually been introduced, so she wasn't going to creep him out by calling him that. Their website called him Iron Fist. "So what do we do?"

"Crowd control. We're trying to get people out of the way and inside," she said, waving an arm at the people huddled in the Starbucks'. "If you can take out some of the blue guys, go for it, but don't go out of your way. They're tough. The Avengers should be here soon. We're just running interference for now."

"Why--" Luke said, but stopped, looking up and taking off his sunglasses in surprise. "God _damn_ , is that Jessica--?"

"Besides the point, hurry up and help out or get out of my way," Darcy snapped, shoving past Luke and Iron Fist. She paused, pointing at Coulson. "And if he tells you to do something, listen. No questions. Got it?"

"Got it," Iron Fist said, following her. She had just enough time to see Luke sigh and start following the both of them before she turned and charged back into the thick of things.

* * *

She only caught glimpses of Luke and Iron Fist in the next few minutes--Luke acting as a human shield as he herded people back to the Starbucks' and Iron Fist running interference, clearing a path with the weird glowing punch thing that his file had mentioned. They made a good team.

The closest she had, and for now it worked well enough, was Coulson picking off any blue people who got too close while she ducked and ran and tried to ignore the burning in her knees. Overhead, Jessica soared and Darcy could occasionally hear the loud thumps that she presumed were the promised rough landings--knowing Jessica, probably strategically placed, using blue guys to soften things up a little before taking off again.

Suddenly people stopped, gasping and looking up, and Darcy felt momentarily annoyed at the sheer abundance of people making themselves easy targets. Except then she looked up too, and smiled. Overhead, Thor flew over. Spider-man swung by several buildings over. She could hear the Hulk's roars approaching.

The Avengers had finally showed up.

"Let's go," she called trying to get everyone's attention again, waving her arms. "This way, come on, stop being collateral damage, _move it_!"

Jessica landed beside her with a thump that would have made Darcy wince under normal circumstances. "Your buddies arrived. What now?"

Darcy looked back over her shoulder. The main fighting looked to be taking place several blocks over. There were still people out. Way too many people, New York was like a goddamn kicked anthill right about now.

"Find another block. Work on getting people out of the way. You go left, I'll go right." She pointed in the indicated directions, not having time for "your left or my left" bullshit. "Your boyfriends can keep up the work here."

Jessica glared, but nodded and jumped back in the air, soaring off. Darcy waded back through to Luke or Iron Fist, whoever she could find first. She found Luke taking a breather in the Starbucks and repeated her plan, then looked around for Coulson.

No Coulson. Right. She should have figured that he'd ninja-vanish when the Avengers showed up.

That was cool, she could do this on her own, anyway.

Darcy grabbed a splintered length of chair to use as a bludgeon and charged back out, turning right and making her way down another length of street, waving people into doorways. Others were doing the same. She huffed, out of breath and positive that she'd be paying for this later, down another street and bent double to try and gasp in some air.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and waved it off, pointing to a nearby building. "Hiding place, buddy," she managed to get out. "Back that way."

"The King of Atlantis does not _hide_."

That... kind of got all of her attention right there. She looked up slowly. The complete and utter lack of a shirt would have got her attention too. Besides showing off a truly impressive torso, it kind of highlighted that this guy wasn't blue.

He looked almost human, except for the tiny _things_ on his ankles. Were those wings or fins? She couldn't tell. And his ears weren't right. They pointed. King Elf?

No. He'd said Atlantis--

But Atlantis wasn't real, was it?

He scowled down at her, impossibly arched eyebrows making the expression even more imperious, and jumped up, flying-- _flying_?!--back to where she'd determined the main fight was going down. Her brain froze on one stupid thought-- _How do those tiny little wings get him to fly?_ and then she had her phone in her hands again, dialing furiously. This time she got through.

"What?" Maria Hill's voice snapped.

"Some asshole calling himself the King of Atlantis just bumped into me and flew off," Darcy said, not even bothering to rib Hill on her abrupt answer. "Looks kind of human-ish, but acts like he's King Blue Guy."

Hill was quiet for just long enough for Darcy to hear the commotion on the other end of the line. SHIELD wasn't just sitting still during all this, then. Good to know, even if she hadn't seen any of their agents. Then again, she supposed that if they were good at their jobs, she really wouldn't.

"Keep your eyes open and report _directly_ back to me if you hear anything else," Hill said, giving her another number. Darcy saved it to her phone's memory and hung up, slipping the phone back into her pocket. Okay. So, now what?

She tightened her grip on her makeshift club and took off in the direction that the Shirtless Wonder had flown off in. Something was up.

* * *

The fighting was... terrifying. She'd been scared shitless in New Mexico, and had been safely away from everything when the Chitauri had invaded, and running _into_ something this big--way bigger than one giant alien robot wrecking a little town--was something really new. And stupid. Darcy wasn't ruling out stupid.

She really needed to have a heart-to-heart with Peter when all this was over. Running head-first into shit like this day after day was pretty much the least healthy thing ever.

It turned out that occasionally dropping in on her dorm's Call of Duty tournaments the first year or two of college had some practical use, in that not running straight down streets was just as idiotic in real life as it was in the game. Beyond that--nothing like a video game. The blue guys--really, should she just call them Atlanteans at this point?--were shooting everywhere, assorted police and National Guard were shooting back, and then there were Avengers, off in the distance, doing their thing.

Cursing herself, she ran towards that whole mess.

"Ma'am, you're gonna have to turn back," one officer said, holding up an arm when she got to a makeshift police barricade. Piled up cars made a good barricade, she noted.

"Yeah, not gonna work," she said, fishing around in her bag and pretending she didn't notice how the officer tensed. "Darcy Lewis, Agent of SHIELD." Maybe it was because she was stressed as hell, but it was a lot easier to say this time than it was a few days ago.

The cop glanced at her badge, where she looked clean and had grinned at the camera, and then back up at her now--dirty, bloodied, with her stupid ponytail trying its damnedest to escape and her glasses cracked--and said, "You're going in there with _that_?"

"Huh?" She looked at where he pointed, to the club in her hand, and felt her face redden despite everything. "Oh. I've also got this Stark Tech thing--it shoots lasers, you don't even--look, I need to get through."

"Right," the cop said doubtfully. He glanced at her badge again, then back to the army of blue Atlanteans trying to, she didn't know, conquer a McDonald's two blocks down. "I don't have time for this. You're on your own."

"Your confidence is astounding," she called, already hopping past the cop cars and looking for a place to move forward and hide at the same time. Darcy looked up at the rooftops, envious of Peter and his webslingers.

"Over here," called a voice.

Darcy looked over and swore. "I thought you'd be gone by now."

Coulson crouched behind an overturned car, just barely visible to her as she scurried over. He held his gun at the ready. "I may have handed over my duties to you, but I'm not sure you're ready to go into a war zone alone just yet."

She looked over at him, mouth open. "Excuse you? Handed over your--" They both ducked as an Atlantean weapon fired over their heads, and Coulson fired back. Darcy winced at the noise. "Goddammit, give me some warning before you do that! I thought Fury gave me this job."

Coulson smiled that infuriating bland smile again, but didn't say anything. He pointed to another hidey-hole instead. Darcy poked her head out from behind the car, decided it was safe, and bolted, her knees screaming.

"What exactly are you planning to do?" Coulson asked curiously once they were safely behind cover again.

"Hill said to keep my eyes open, so I'm keeping my damn eyes open. I need to find--look, it'll take too long to explain. Just watch my back."

Coulson raised an eyebrow, but didn't contradict her or tell her to get back where it was safe. Safer. Nothing within several miles of here was in any way safe, so far as she could tell. Her esteem for him edged up slightly.

They moved forward agonizingly slowly, darting from cover to cover while Coulson did the majority of the back-watching. Darcy got two good shots in, both from her wrist Taser, and Coulson made sure the Atlanteans wouldn't get up again. She would have been way more freaked out by the efficiency with which he did that if she hadn't been so scared.

After what felt like hours, Darcy pulled on Coulson's jacket. "That's him! See him?"

Coulson squinted. "Why isn't he wearing a shirt?"

"I know, right? I need to get closer." She pulled out her phone and called the number Hill had given her, popping the bluetooth earphone in to keep her hands free while Coulson moved to the front of her and started trying to ease her over. "He's right in front of me," Darcy said excitedly, not even waiting for Hill to finish answering. "Shirtless guy, King Whatever, he's right--"

"Are you actually _there?!_ " Hill said, sounding aghast. "What the hell are you doing, Lewis?"

Darcy would have pulled the phone away from her ear if it had been at all possible. "I'm keeping an eye out."

She could almost hear Hill smacking her forehead. "I didn't mean--Lewis, we have agents--never mind. What's going on?"

Darcy shaded her eyes with one hand. "He's fighting with Thor. That's really all I can tell right now, I'm not close enough to hear them. It looks bad, though, really dramatic."

"I can see it on our feeds, Lewis." Hill's voice sounded scary-patient. Like, two seconds away from throwing punches scary patient. "How far away are you?"

"Maybe a block and a half?"

"Closer than our nearest agent," Hill admitted reluctantly. "How'd you get there?"

She opened her mouth to say that Coulson had used his freaky SHIELD ninja ways to escort her, but paused. Fury knew Coulson was alive, that was a given. But did Hill? She was Fury's second-in-command, but Fury was a sneaky bastard. She could be sneaky for now, too. It could wait.

"I had help," she settled for saying. "We'll talk about it later, okay?"

"I'm sorry, I forgot that we're fending off an invasion on _your_ timetable," Hill snapped. "Either get in there and call me back when you have something worthwhile or get out." And Hill hung up.

"And a nice fucking day to you, too," Darcy growled, pulling out the earpiece. Coulson may have smirked. "Don't you start, too," Darcy said, pointing at him. "Just help me get over there."

The closer they got, the more terrifying things were. Coulson traded his empty pistol for a dropped Atlantean weapon, figured out how to use it in no time flat, and handed Darcy one, too. "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?" she said.

"Point, squeeze, don't be in front of one," Coulson said. She glared at him.

She got to use it, of course. A small group of Atlanteans noticed them trying to sneak around and while Coulson was occupied killing the hell out of most of the group, two cornered her.

Darcy Tased one, fumbled with the stupid weapon and shot the other in the chest, froze, and shot the the first one when she heard him getting up. She stood over the bodies, hyperventilating, and jumped when Coulson touched her shoulder. "Keep moving," he told her quietly.

"What, just now, or like, as a general life philosophy?" she asked. Her whole face felt numb.

He didn't answer. Of course he didn't.

"Have you noticed that we're not getting any closer?" Darcy asked a few minutes later.

"They're being driven back," Coulson said. "Towards the harbor, unless I'm mistaken."

"No, I think you're right," Darcy said with a grimace. "We'd better hurry. I think they're retreating. Or about to, if they're smart."

"Darcy?"

She looked up, holding the stupid freaking Atlantean weapon like a teddy bear, but it was Peter. Spider-man. He clung to the next building over a few floors up, and webbed over to her. "Oh my God, it _is_ you--what the hell are you doing here?"

"Shouldn't you be fighting Atlanteans?" she asked, shifting the Atlantean weapon to one arm and grabbing for him.

"What's an Atlantean? How'd you even--are you okay? I've got to get you out of--"

"Don't even think about it, do you know how long it took me to get this far? Can you get me closer?"

"Closer? To what?"

Darcy pointed in the general direction of King Shirtless, who was still having some sort of epic battle with Thor. And Steve had joined the mix at some point. It looked frantic. "There."

She could almost see Peter's eyes widen under his mask. "Oh no. No no no."

"I need to know what's going on. I have a job to do, remember?"

"I thought that job was you sitting in a tower and telling people what to do!"

"Right now, it's getting over there and telling Maria Hill what the hell's going on. I think this is as far as I can get with just me and--" She looked back over her shoulder. No Coulson. "And these," she finished up, holding up the Atlantean weapon. Her wrist taser flashed in the sunlight. Not even a scratch on it. She'd have to thank Tony later. "Come on, Pete. Don't make me beg."

He looked over at the fighting, then at the big freaking weapon in her hand. "Climb on," he said, sounding resigned. "Hold on tight. And try not to choke me, okay?"

"Got it," she said, letting the weapon drop to the ground. It wasn't like she had to take it in for SHIELD examination. They could take their pick. She jumped on Peter's back like he was going to give her a piggyback ride, felt him tense up, and--

She did her best not to scream, in terror or exhilaration or some mix of the two. She'd never been skydiving before, but this had to be that same kind of rush.

By the time they reached Steve, the Atlanteans were in an all-out retreat. King Shirtless looked worse for the wear, bruised and bloodied, though he was still giving kicking Thor's ass fifty feet in the air a really good try. Steve, also battered and bloodied in his Captain America gear, looked surprised to see them both.

"Darcy? What the hell are you doing here?" he asked.

"Never a 'hi, nice to see you,'" she muttered, and then louder, "Hill wanted a closer look at what was going on." She neglected to mention that this whole stupid mess might have been a misunderstanding on her own part, but it was entirely too late for that now.

"Whoever he is, he's tough," Steve said, looking up at King Shirtless.

Thor and the guy broke apart, both taking deep heaving breaths. King Shirtless flew up slightly higher and scowled down on them all.

"You may have survived this day," he called, "But do not think that you've won. Take this for the warning that it is: King Namor of Atlantis declares war. Until so long as you stop defiling my ocean kingdom, you will bleed."

As Darcy processed this, King Shirtless--King Namor?--turned and dove into the harbor. The last of the Atlanteans followed suit, leaving wreckage and bodies behind them.

"Well, shit," Darcy said.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which everyone stops to breathe, bridges look burned, and Darcy isn't down for the count yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to everyone for reading.

"Atlantis," Fury said. He tapped a spot on the map, which lit up. "So far as we've been able to tell, it's right about here."

"I thought Atlantis was a myth," Peter said.

"As one considered a myth who fought another yesterday," Thor said, leaning back in his chair, "perhaps you should be open-minded."

It had been astonishingly easy to talk everybody into attending the briefing, Darcy noted. All it took was being jumped by somebody completely unfamiliar and unknown who caused hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage and hundreds of deaths and everyone finally got moving in the same direction all at once.

But it was a completely horrible situation, and definitely not worth the trade-off.

Darcy sat out of the way with her legs stretched out. The bandages on her knees made them stiff, and the complete and utter soreness from so much running and crouching and lifting made everything stiffer. And of course, she hadn't slept at all, so she had a huge cup of coffee in hand. At least SHIELD made good coffee. And had good medical staff; her knees and assorted other shrapnel wounds had been disinfected and bandaged up in no time flat, along with ice and painkillers for a giant bruise on her face and sprained arm that she hadn't even had time to notice.

Everybody looked like hell. Even Tony, who had come back immediately from California and sat nursing his own cup of coffee.

"So far, everything seems to corroborate what this Namor says," Fury said. "The attacks we've been investigating for the past month seem to have been committed by Atlanteans, and all were done on facilities that operate in the ocean. Oil rig platforms. Plants."

"Ships," put in Tony. "Not exactly facilities like the others, still on the water."

"If Atlantis is underwater--which is pretty incredible, I'd love to know how they aren't crushed by the pressure--they'd have plenty of reasons to be concerned with what we're doing to it," said Bruce.

"But why now?" asked Clint. "We've been pouring shit in there forever. Everyone has."

"Maybe it's a question of manpower," said Steve. "It could have taken this long for them to build up a viable army."

"Or technology," Tony added. "Never rule out technology."

"Those weapons were more advanced than I'd have thought from blue fishpeople," said Peter. "Darcy, you used one. What did you think?"

And then all eyes were on her, like some horrible classroom. "It had a lot of kick to it?" she said, fishing around for something. It sounded incredibly weak, even to her ears. "What? I don't know shit about guns. It was awful when it hit people, that's about the extent of my knowledge. I'm Miss Non-lethal, remember?"

Natasha gave her a measuring look, but it seemed to be enough for just about everyone else, because the briefing--debriefing--whatever--went on. Darcy was the first out in the hallway when it was over, walking stiffly with her hands in her pockets.

Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, and Danny Rand sat waiting out in the hallway. "Hey," she said.

"I hate you forever," said Jessica.

"Look, I think Fury only wants to like, thank you or something. He's not gonna force you play for the team. I got it from him in writing."

"And you trust him?" asked Danny.

Darcy opened her mouth, thought again, and closed it. "I'm really sorry," she said for the billionth time.

"It's done," Luke said, sounding tired. "We did what we needed to do."

"Did Tony talk to you yet?"

"Who?"

"Stark," Jessica said, still sounding annoyed. "She calls him Tony."

"Oh. Nah, not yet."

"I'll send him over. Don't let him negotiate, okay? He can afford it. Don't tell him I said so, but he damn well better afford three times your fee. I'm grateful. And sorry."

"Ms. Jones? Mr. Cage? Mr. Rand?"

Danny looked over at Fury's office and sighed heavily, getting to his feet. "Duty calls again."

"Fucking yay," grumbled Jessica.

"I'm sorry," Darcy called again as the door shut behind them. She jumped as she felt a hand on her shoulder. "What?" she snapped, turning.

It was Natasha. "How about we get breakfast," she said. "Just us girls."

Darcy was so stunned that she didn't even think before saying, "Okay."

* * *

They sat in an empty corner of the SHIELD cafeteria, both with fresh cups of coffee. Darcy loaded her tray down with cereal, fruit, and a bagel and realized that she couldn't eat a bite. Natasha had some fruit that seemed to mostly be a prop.

"You killed someone yesterday, didn't you?" Natasha asked without preamble.

Darcy looked up from poking at her bagel with a plastic fork. "Huh?"

"It's all right if you did. No one's going to think less of you, not here. Especially if they were trying to kill you."

"That's easy for you to say," Darcy said, going back to poking. "You're good at this."

Natasha chased some grapes from the fruit cup around with a fork. "I was very young when I killed my first person. Much younger than you. It takes practice to be 'good at it.' Most people don't want to kill; you have to train them out of it."

Darcy hadn't read very deeply into Natasha's file. She really didn't have the necessary security level, for one thing. For another, it felt... invasive. She hadn't read into any of the Avengers' files. But right now, she felt curious in a horrible, morbid way. "Were you scared? The first time you killed someone."

"Terrified. For me, mostly." Natasha's gentle smile twisted. "And a little for them, I suppose. But mostly for me."

"I didn't mean to do it," Darcy said, looking back down. "He was just there in front of me, and they don't just stay down when you zap them, and--it was awful, his whole chest was just--" She shuddered, thinking of it again. "And the other one, he was already down. And I shot him. When did I get to be the kind of person who shoots someone when they're down?"

Natasha caught her hand. "I'm going to tell you this, and you're going to believe me, okay? There is _nothing wrong_ with doing whatever you need to do to survive. Including talking to someone. SHIELD has a wonderful group of people for this exact situation."

Darcy gave Natasha a watery, lopsided smile. "Do you use them?"

Natasha gave her a sad, knowing look. "Of course not. But you should have learned by now that none of us--" the _us_ in question being the Avengers, Darcy was sure, and not SHIELD--"are great people to model your life after. Talk to someone, okay? You seem like the type who does better with that."

"I am," she said, swiping at her eyes with her wrists. "It gets better, right? You learn to live with it or something?"

Natasha hesitated. "It never goes away," she said finally. "But yes, you can learn to live with it."

"Just keep moving," Darcy said. "Right."

* * *

The tower was like a tiny anthill. Peter wasn't there, because he had to pretend like he still had a normal life, which meant being back in Queens with his aunt for the time being, since classes at Empire State were canceled for the next day or two. But everyone else was there, doing things. Anything. Trying to reach out to whatever contacts they had, or tinkering with weaponry. Tony had confiscated Darcy's Taser bracelet the minute they'd walked inside and made it clear that she wasn't leaving without backup until he had upgraded it.

("My ass," she'd said, but then Thor had glued himself to her and she really couldn't be _too_ angry, because Thor was basically a cool older brother with a really big hammer, and that made it sting less somehow.)

So everyone ran around like flapping chickens except her and Thor. She sat on the couch with her tablet and a bag of Doritos, huddled over all the reports that were constantly being emailed and updated, and Thor sat on the other end of the couch, flipping through a magazine. Apparently he was thrilled that whatever the Atlanteans were and whatever they wanted, they weren't Dark Elves after all.

Darcy held her head in her hands and groaned. "I have a bachelor's degree in political science and I grew up watching Disney movies. Life has in no way prepared me to figure out what to do about an actual king of anything, much less an underwater people that we never knew about because the ocean is _really fucking big_ and hey, did you know that we actually know more about the moon's surface than the ocean's?"

Thor gave her an amused look. "You are aware that I am a prince, are you not? You conduct yourself well enough."

Clint, passing by and texting someone, laughed and clapped Darcy on the back. "Judging by that choking noise, I guess that would be a no."

She cleared her throat and shook her head. "No, I wasn't actually aware of that," she said, croaking out the words. "I'm pretty sure you never mentioned that, like, ever. Does Jane know? Does Fury?"

"We've spoken of it," Thor said, going back to flipping through _People_ like it was no big thing.

"And Jane never told me?! Jesus, what is with you people?"

"In all fairness, she has been quite distracted of late," Thor said, examining one page. "Tell me, do you think this gown would look fetching on her?" He held the picture out for Darcy to examine. "I have a mind to take her on a date to soothe her nerves once this is over. Pepper has recommended several potential locations."

"It's swanky. Look, Thor--should I call you Prince Thor or something?" She took off her glasses and rubbed at her forehead. On top of everything else, this bit of information was all just a _little_ too much.

"That is not necessary. Besides, I consider you a friend."

And there was an idea. "So as a friend--and also as sort of your boss, but mostly as a friend--can I ask you for a favor?"

"Of course," Thor said with a big, Thor-like grin. "May I ask for a return favor in assistance with courting Jane?"

"I'm not sure you need me to play wingman at this point in your relationship, but sure, so long as it's in Jane's best interest. So have you ever, like, talked to a representative from somewhere else? One of those other worlds I've heard Jane mention on your world tree thing?"

Now Thor looked slightly less than pleased. "I have had dealings with the other realms, yes. I cannot say that they ended well. I was an impetuous youth."

"But you can do it. You know how it's supposed to go in a not just watching on C-SPAN way." He looked blank as he always did when she mentioned specifically Earthy things, so she clarified, "It's one of the TV channels here. Dedicated to like, politics and shit. Check it out. Hey, JARVIS. C-SPAN, _por favor_?"

"Of course, Ms. Lewis."

She turned to Thor and Clint with a sheepish grin. "I was kind of hoping to hear him do Spanish with that accent. Anyway, see?"

Thor studied the screen intently, watching the droning in the U.S. House of Representatives and snorted. "This is what passes for politics among your people? Where is the hospitality? The feasting, the revelry, the fights?"

"The internet," Darcy said. "But you get the picture, right? What I studied in college, it was more along the lines of this. Pick apart their speeches, watch for general trends, spend summers tagging along on campaign trips."

"Except for the semester you spent tagging along with a scientist," Clint said, grabbing the bag of Doritos.

Darcy grabbed it back. "Getting all my science credits out of the way at once? Hell yes. And I like the travel. _Anyway_ , since I never interned in DC or anything, I never got the know-how into the behind-the-scenes stuff. Up until lately, the most powerful person I'd ever met was the governor during election season."

"What is it that you wish?" Thor asked, crossing his arms and looking at her in a way that reminded her of her dad. Or a school principal. "Advice on how to conduct yourself? The ways of Asgard are not those of Earth, and I know not the ways of this Atlantis at all."

"No," Darcy said. She swallowed, wondering if the plan that was starting to churn in her head was an absolutely awful one. "I should call Fury. Ten bucks says he tells me this is a stupid idea."


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Darcy gets answers, gets a lot of dirty looks, and does not quite get off of Maria Hill's bad side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost at the end! Thanks for reading.

"It's not a terrible idea," Fury said grudgingly. "Definitely not the worst I've heard in the last few days. But there's a few flaws."

"Like how Thor and Namor beat the shit out of each other for a while on national television," Darcy said. "Yeah, I know."

"And how those of us who live on the thirty or so percent of the Earth above the water line don't have a leader to speak for us as a whole."

"And there's that," Darcy said, rubbing her forehead again. "Couldn't you do it?"

Fury actually laughed. More of a dry chuckle, but it was the first time she'd ever heard him make anything resembling an amused noise around her. Score one point for Darcy. "I'm flattered, Lewis, but no. I'll pass it along, though."

"Who's higher up than you?" she asked, genuinely curious.

"Your suggestion has officially been noted and will be reviewed," he said, and hung up.

Darcy glared at her phone. "Motherfucker," she snarled, putting it away with way more force than necessary.

"Problems?" Clint asked, leaning against the wall.

"Nick Fucking Fury. Just..." She made a noise of frustration. "Why does _he_ get to have all the answers and act all mysterious around the rest of us?"

"Because he's the boss," Clint said. "You want the answers, you work your way up."

"No thanks. This is hard enough work for me. If I'm at the edge here, I'd probably haul off and spontaneously combust if I had his job."

"What's this idea of yours, anyway?"

Darcy sighed. "Find some way to reach out to Namor, get Thor to mediate as a neutral third-party. Except he's not exactly neutral, and we don't have anyone I can think of to negotiate _with_ Namor."

"You can always put on a sparkly crown, call yourself Empress of the Land, and pass yourself off. They probably don't have TV down there, what's he gonna know?"

She snorted. "And once Fury's done killing me into little tiny bits..."

"Don't be so worried what he thinks. If any of us gave more than a crap and a half of what his opinion meant, we wouldn't be here. Nice job out there, by the way."

The sudden change of subject caught her off-guard. "Huh?"

Clint nodded in the general direction of outside. "Out there. Getting to us."

"Oh." She shrugged. "It was stupid."

"Yeah, well. We do stupid for a living."

She seized the opportunity. "Hey, Clint? What happened with you and Erik?"

He didn't so much as blink. "Mind-controlled by Loki."

"Oh." Suddenly, the reason he'd been so on edge when one of the temporary liaison agents kept needling him about the invasion became a hell of a lot more clear. And a few other things. Clint was good at killing people. She'd seen the videos. Clint plus mind-control... "Are you okay?" It was a stupid question. She regretted it as soon as she'd asked it.

He shrugged, not looking at her. "I've done a lot of things I don't like thinking about. This is just another one."

She was pretty sure it was bullshit. "That's bullshit, right?"

He let out his breath. "Yeah, it's bullshit."

"Okay. You can like, I don't know, talk to me or whatever...?"

He gave her a wry twist of his mouth that wasn't a smile. "I'm not really the talking type."

"Yeah. I thought not. But, you know, anyway."

"Yeah. Thanks." Clint patted her on the shoulder and walked on. Darcy blew out a breath.

* * *

Two days later, and Darcy felt distinctly off-balance. It didn't help that Tony woke her up entirely too early one morning, knocking at her door to hand her the new, improved Taser bracelet before leaving for some meeting. Even with the new bracelet, she didn't have a chance to get out. If something from this world caused this much paperwork, she wondered, how much sleep had people lost when aliens had tried to invade?

Fury called her again. Afternoon, instead of early, which took her by surprise. "Bring Thor to SHIELD NYC right the hell now," he said.

"Got it," she said. "Anything else?"

"When I say look professional, I _mean_ look professional." He hung up.

This time, she didn't argue, though her definition of "professional" was somewhat loose by virtue of timing. She wore a button-up blouse that didn't look like it had been a week in the dryer, and that was about as good as Fury was going to get.

"If timing was important, I could have flown us there," Thor grumbled, crammed in the back of a cab with her.

"No way," Darcy said, trying frantically to touch up her makeup. "You might look cover-model fresh all the time, but I've got to work at this." The bruise from the Atlantean incursion was now green and brown and gross instead of purple and swollen. Maybe she could distract from it with really red lipstick...

"You look a proper shieldmaiden," he said, then laughed softly.

"Yeah, that works on multiple levels. You ready?"

"For a mere council?" Thor looked scornful.

"It's not a mere anything," she said sharply. "This is my planet, Thor."

"Of course," he said, looking mollified. "I spoke in haste. I do understand the full import of any negotiations I may be asked to mediate."

"I trust you, dude," she said, patting him on one massive arm. "I want you to know that."

"And I would not betray the trust of a friend," he said, looking more serious than she'd seen him since... since New Mexico, actually. She shivered.

"Yeah, I know," she said. Trying to fix her makeup didn't seem as important after that.

* * *

She sat in the hallway, messing with her phone.

Seriously, why even bother to ask her to come along if she wasn't even going to be invited into the meeting? Though, Darcy had to admit, it wasn't like she could really add much. Were there already a bunch of world leaders holed up in the conference room? It was simultaneously a thrilling and nerve-wracking thought.

"Lewis."

She looked up. Maria Hill stood there, arms crossed. Not tapping her foot, but definitely waiting. "Oh. Hey."

Hill rolled her eyes. Okay, so "hey" was not the correct greeting for the Deputy Director of SHIELD. Got it. "Follow me," she said, sounding weary.

Darcy got up, brushed off her slacks, and trotted along behind Hill to another, smaller conference room. "Ah, _shit_ ," Darcy said when the door opened.

Carol Danvers, Jessica, Luke, and Danny sat inside, wearing (thankfully) different clothes than they had been a few days ago. At least they'd been allowed to go home at some point, Darcy thought. Hoped.

"Nice to see you, too," Luke said, looking grouchy.

"They didn't keep you here for like, days, did they?" Darcy asked, pulling out a chair and settling down.

"No," Jessica said. "They sent agents to come collect us."

Darcy winced.

"Agent Woo was very nice about it," Danny said.

"You're such a goddamned suck-up," Jessica snapped.

Danvers, sitting well away from the others, rolled her eyes.

"If you'd all shut up for a minute," Hill said, not bothering to sit, "we can be out of here sooner." She waited, and nobody else said anything. "We're here to figure out what the hell to do with you." The "you" in question being Danvers, Luke, Danny, and Jessica, Darcy assumed.

Or maybe she shouldn't count herself out of it, she reconsidered. Hill had been pretty pissed at her for running in during the Atlantean thing.

"Is 'letting us go' an option?" Jessica asked.

"This isn't police custody, Ms. Jones."

"Could have fooled me," Jessica said under her breath.

Hill gave her a measured look before continuing. "You've all made yourself known to the public in the last few days. Sweeping this under the rug is no longer a viable option."

Jessica and Danvers gave Darcy dirty looks. Darcy hunched down in her seat.

"But this doesn't mean that SHIELD will be drafting you," Hill went on. "For one thing, we've always had much better results when operatives joining us have done so voluntarily."

"For another, the draft is illegal, right?" Luke asked.

"SHIELD doesn't operate on US law, kid," Danvers said.

Hill smiled tightly. "That's correct. However, we do try not to antagonize any of our host countries too much. And that includes kidnapping citizens and pressing them to work for us. I'm authorized to tell you that if you _do_ choose to join us voluntarily, you would be more than welcome and Ms. Lewis can pull up the benefits package from Human Resources to pass around."

"I can?" Darcy asked blankly.

Danvers looked at her suspiciously. "I thought you said you were an agent."

Hill paused and looked down, giving Darcy a look. Darcy felt about two inches tall. "I... may have overstated?"

"We'll talk about _that_ later, too," Hill said under her breath. Louder, she continued, "But if that doesn't sound appealing... it'll be messy, but SHIELD has engaged in cover-ups before."

"There's video out of us," Danny said.

"You've got it easy; they can't see _your_ face while you're flying around like an idiot," Jessica said.

"We've already started on the groundwork," Hill continued as if they hadn't spoken. "How far you want it to go depends on your decisions."

Without even hesitating, Jessica said, "I'm out."

"I'm... in," Danvers said. "If I'd been in New York at the time... yeah, I'm in."

"I'm out, but could you leave the videos up?" Luke said. "It's great publicity."

“Out,” Danny said. “For now.”

Hill smiled tightly. "We'll be in touch. You can go. Lewis, you stay."

Darcy was half out of her seat, but sank back in. She waited for everyone to leave the room, not looking at anything but the grain of the table in front of her. Hill closed the door and leaned on the wall next to it, arms crossed. "Thor and Colonel Fury should be on their way to the Helicarrier right about now," she said.

"The Heli--oh. Is that where they're going to be meeting up with everyone?"

"The first of several meetings. King T'Challa of Wakanda contacted Namor and got him to agree to talks, by the way. If he's a man--Atlantean--of his word, we might be able to breathe a little easier for a while. He's called a cease-fire for at least the duration of negotiations.”

"That's good," Darcy said, relieved. "And he's okay with Thor mediating?"

"I haven't heard otherwise."

"Awesome."

They were quiet for a while, before Hill sighed and said, "Lewis, if you're going to act like a goddamn agent, you're going to need actual training. You could have died running in to that the other day, and then we'd be out another liaison."

"I know," Darcy said. "I kind of figured that out when they started shooting at me."

"Improper asset management," Hill said. "It would have been on _my_ ass. So either you enroll in the course and learn to take an order every once in a while, or you stay inside. Got it?"

"Got it," Darcy said.

"How _did_ you get that far in, anyway?" Hill said. "I wouldn't have expected that from you."

Darcy looked up. Did Hill know, she wondered again. Until she could ask Fury, she decided again to err on the side of caution. "You know. Hidden depths," she said, trying for casual.

Hill didn't seem completely convinced, staring at her suspiciously. "Right," she said. "Go talk to HR."


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which everyone moves forward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's the end! Thanks to everyone who read. This was kind of emotionally and physically exhausting to write, and while I have a wrap up in mind I can't promise that it won't be just a single chapter one-shot months from now. But I have fun writing these characters and I hope that you all have fun reading them, so it's all good.
> 
> Thanks again!

A week later, Darcy waited in front of the door to the research wing. Alone, this time. And foodless, which probably wouldn't endear her to anyone.

"Hey," Jane said when the door buzzed open, grabbing her in a surprisingly big hug for someone so tiny. "I've been so worried about you."

"Yeah, yeah," Darcy said, waving her off. "You know me, I land on my feet."

"Are you okay? I saw some of it on the news--"

"I'm fine. I'm great. How was your date with Thor?"

Jane giggled. "We went to the nicest restaurant. And he let me take him to some of the museums in DC. He wasn't bored or anything. He seemed so interested in all of it." She beamed. "It's so nice to date someone who actually listens to me talk and isn't constantly trying to one-up me."

"And him having the body of a literal god doesn't hurt either, right?"

That got the expected laugh and blush. "No, it certainly doesn't," Jane agreed.

"Listen, can you get Erik? I wanted to talk. Actually, tell him I want to apologize, that might get him out here faster."

"Okay," Jane said slowly, eyebrows furrowed. When Darcy just shrugged helplessly, Jane must have decided that she could get the story from Erik or something, because she went back down the hall. Darcy waited.

She smiled sheepishly when she saw Erik coming up the hallway, and gave him a little wave. "Hey."

"Hi, Darcy."

"Look, I wanted to say... God. Okay, so I probably shouldn't have gotten all weird on you about how you freaked out in my apartment."

"For the last time, I didn't 'freak out'--"

"But, I was having a little heart-to-heart with Clint, and I found out a little of what happened. So I get you not wanting to talk about it. And I'll let it drop if you want, but if you _want_ to talk about it... I'm here, okay?"

He looked broody. "I've already spoken about it at length with SHIELD's counselors."

"How are they, by the way? I've been meaning to make an appointment. I--look, I killed two guys the other day. Don't tell Jane, okay? And I'm kind of--I'm not sure how I feel about it." Her voice cracked. "They were trying to kill me, but then I shot them and they were just--"

"I built the machine that made it possible for the Chitauri to come through to Earth," Erik said quietly. "So I don't think two deaths on your hands is any worse than that."

"Clint said you were mind-controlled."

"And how does that excuse me? It's not like I went away." His face twisted as he remembered. "I'll be making up for that until the day I die."

"You're a good guy, Erik," Darcy said uncertainly. Impulsively, she added, "You helped me move."

He laughed, a harsh, abrupt noise. "I'll be sure to add that to the positive side of the balance."

"It means a lot to _me_. You're a good friend. You're like the cool uncle I never had."

His face softened. "That means a lot. Thank you, Darcy."

She hugged him. "So, yeah. Apologizing. I'll drop it if you want."

"And you can talk to me if you need to."

"Got it. I might need to." She pulled back and grimaced. "I gotta go. I just wanted to drop by before another meeting."

"Busy girl," Erik said. "I'll tell Jane you said good-bye."

"You're awesome, Erik," Darcy said, letting herself out. "Next time I come back, I'm bringing a sandwich tray, I promise."

* * *

"You'll be pleased to hear that Thor is doing well at mediating," Fury said. He sighed. "Everyone _else_ is being stubborn as hell, but at least he's doing his job."

"If all else, he could bang heads together," Darcy said.

She might have seen one corner of Fury's mouth twitch at the mental picture, but he was entirely too controlled to let her have the satisfaction, she thought. "Deputy Director Hill discussed enrolling you in the agent course?"

"Yeah. I'm still weighing the positives and negatives, but... yeah, I think I'm gonna do it." She shrugged. "Gotta keep up with the big boys now, I guess."

"And we can hope that you'll absorb a little discipline."

"Maybe a little," she said. Not too much. How would she deal with this absolute clusterfuck if she was a stuffed-shirt with no sense of humor?

Her secret suspicions that Nick Fury had psychic powers weren't at all helped when he said, "Discipline isn't the same as removing what makes one effective, Ms. Lewis. If it were, SHIELD would have collapsed a long time ago."

"Right," she said. "So, does Deputy Director Hill know about Coulson?"

Fury didn't even blink. "No, she does not. And you _will_ keep it that way."

She held up her hands. "Relax, boss, my lips are sealed. I just wanted to make sure." At the look he gave her, she hastily added, "I meant, 'Relax, Director Fury.' I totally meant that."

He shook his head. "Thank you, Ms. Lewis." He gave the door a pointed look, which she took, leaving hastily. Still no yelling, still not fired. Always a good thing in her book.

* * *

She was surprised when Jessica had been willing to meet with her in the Starbucks, still left standing after everything, but not unhappy. Even though Jessica still looked grouchy.

Jessica usually looked grouchy. What else was new? Darcy ordered herself a drink and a couple of muffins and sat down across from her ex-roommate. "Hey."

"Hey." Jessica took one of the muffins without asking. Fair enough. Muffins were a pretty shitty peace offering, but since Jessica took a bite instead of throwing it at Darcy's head, it was a positive sign.

"Everything going okay?"

"Did SHIELD ask you to check up on me?"

Darcy sighed. "No. Just doing this on my own."

"I had to drop out. I didn't want to deal with the assholes who came up to me after class, or before class, or _during_ class to ask if I was the flying chick from YouTube who dropped people from eight floors up."

"I'm sorry," Darcy said, wincing.

Jessica glared, then slumped. "I could have said no."

"I'm glad you didn't."

"That's the weird thing," Jessica said. "Not everyone wanted to gawk. A few of them wanted to thank me."

"And that's weird? Jess, you were _awesome_ up there."

She smiled faintly before remembering that she was Jessica Jones, hard-ass, and scowled fiercely. "I'm not a hero."

"Sounding kind of defensive there, Jones."

"I'm not. The guy I've been talking to about interning, the private investigator, he said he'd let me start early. I can't actually go with him on any cases since I don't have my license, but it's something. I can pay the bills."

"That's great. You'll do great."

"Yeah, as long as I don't get any assholes running in and asking, 'Hey, didn't I see you on YouTube?'"

"You can always threaten to drop them out a window if they piss you off."

Jessica snorted. "I wouldn't hesitate to follow through."

"I know you wouldn't." Darcy stirred her coffee. "Are we okay?"

"I don't know," Jessica said after a moment. "Give me a few weeks and I'll call you, okay? Or email. Just... let me figure this shit out on my own. And keep SHIELD off my back."

"I can do that," Darcy said.

Behind them, a guy in a leather jacket with an Iron Man patch on each shoulder walked by, did a double take, walked by again, and stared. "Hey, aren't you the YouTube chick?" he asked Jessica.

Darcy wasn't sure whether to laugh or wince as Jessica ground her teeth audibly.

* * *

She waited around after Jessica left, tapping on her phone while her coffee cooled. Someone sat across from her. "I thought you'd show up eventually," she said without looking up.

"Director Fury tells me that you're planning to be a full-fledged agent," Coulson said.

Darcy shrugged. "I can't let other people watch my back all the time. Checking up on me?"

"One final interview, let's call it."

She put her phone down on the table. "You shot at that Atlantean back when Danvers and I first saw one, didn't you?"

He just smiled.

"Yeah, I thought so. And that's why I'm gonna take the agent's course. I don't need a baby-sitter. I'm supposed to _be_ the baby-sitter."

"Just keep your head on straight and you'll be well on your way," Coulson said.

"What do you mean, 'final interview,' anyway?" she asked, handing him the remaining muffin on the table. "You're not gonna reveal that you were dead all along, are you?"

"Technically, I _am_ dead, Ms. Lewis. I thought we'd established that by now."

She groaned. "Bullshit. I'm not talking to a ghost. Dead on paper doesn't equal dead in reality."

"Reality's very subjective. I think that's the entire point of our public relations department." He stood up, muffin in one hand, and held out his free hand to her. "It's been a pleasure observing you, Ms. Lewis."

She shook his hand, watching him suspiciously. "It's been weird, Coulson."

He turned and started walking to the door. She couldn't help it. "Do I pass?" she called after him.

"You're taking the agent course, aren't you?" he said, and then he was gone.

Again.

"You'll be back, you shifty bastard," she muttered to herself. "I'm just betting."

So. Getting a vote of confidence from a dead guy, running into a war zone, finally and for real moving in to her apartment. And possibly ruining her friendship with Jessica for all time. It had been a weird few weeks. But, she thought, getting up from the table, she felt a little like she had after that horrible hangover after watching _Mean Girls_ with Jane, Natasha, and Clint. She could do this.

* * *

A month later, her eyes bugged out when she read the new reports. "What the hell's a MODOK?" she asked.


End file.
